Standing Committee Appointments made in House & Senate
Compiled by Jan Lanier, JD, RN
Chair Public Policy Committee
Senate :
The Senate leadership established 21 standing committees for the 136th General Assembly. The ratio of republicans to democrats is generally representative of the overall Senate ratio of Rs to Ds (roughly 72- 27% ). The committees range in size from 6 to 14 members with the finance committee being the largest. The size of a committee can often signal how much work is expected to come its way. This session the public utilities committee has 11 members, which is consistent with the expected focus of both chambers predicted to be on energy issues. Most of the committees have six to seven members.
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House:
The House cut the number of its standing committees to 27. To do that, Speaker Matt Huffman eliminated all the finance committee subcommittees and changed the focus to others. According to Huffman, his goal was to ensure house members serve on no more than four committees. Most of the committees have nine republicans and four democrats, and like the Senate, those numbers are roughly consistent with the percentage of republicans to democrats in the entire chamber. Only the finance committee with 31 members and the energy committee with 24 members are larger.
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Former Speaker of the House Rep. Jason Stephens was not named chair or vice chair of any committee. As is customary, no members of the house leadership team were named to head any committee (other than the Rules and Reference Committee, which is typically made up largely of members of the chamber’s republican and democrat leadership teams).
Sources: Gongwer-Ohio (1/17/25) House democrats announce committee assignments. Gongwer News Service.
Gongwer-Ohio ( 1/14/25) Speaker reduces committees, names Stewart finance chair. Gongwer News Service.
Gongwer-Ohio (1/14/25) House Committees for 2025-2026. Gongwer News Service.
Gongwer-Ohio (1/13/25) Senate committees for 2025-2026. Gongwer News Service.