Ohio Government Representation
Squire Sanders Public Advocacy's Governmental Relations and Public Advocacy group has successfully represented the interests of businesses, nonprofit organizations, governmental units and trade associations before the Ohio General Assembly and Ohio’s administrative and regulatory agencies.
We offer a sophisticated, comprehensive approach to Ohio state government relations and advocacy, providing clients with a unique combination of extensive legislative and administrative lobbying experience and contacts with unparalleled substantive legal experience. Our combined state-federal teams offer unparalleled reach and expertise in Columbus and Washington DC.
Squire Sanders legislative counseling experience includes preparing and drafting legislation and amendments, providing analyses of pending legislation, preparing testimony and client position papers, as well as monitoring and evaluating committee hearings at the state and federal level. We assist our clients in proactively building relationships with government officials and in developing advocacy strategies that can be integrated into government relations plans.
Our approach focuses on:
- The needs of the client, aligning the client’s objectives with the strengths and assets of Squire Sanders Public Advocacy team members
- Placing the client front-and-center with legislators, statewide elected officials and other critical policy and decision makers
- Building strong and lasting relationships with governmental decision makers including legislators, regulators and state-wide officeholders
- Offering a full-service approach to meeting client needs, matching proven government relations and legislative counseling experience with the intellectual resources of a global law firm in areas including health care, finance, science and technology, business, tax, public law, environment, and labor and employment
- Focusing on delivering results for our clients in a broad range of areas from a variety of health care initiatives including telemedicine reform to agency rule changes, and capital and line item budget appropriations
Over the years, we have secured major legislative and regulatory victories in Ohio on behalf of our clients, including:
- Securing capital appropriations for a regional research institution
- Negotiating a successful resolution of a multi million-dollar contract dispute involving a state agency, the Ohio Attorney General and the Ohio Inspector General
- Spearheading the successful construction of a new stadium for an NFL franchise from conception through opening
- Securing tax code modifications for a CART championship racing team, a major automotive supplier and a grain cargo corporation
- Providing campaign finance and election law consulting in Ohio for international retailers, national financial institutions, various statewide nonprofit organizations, businesses and trade associations
- Pursuing agency rule changes on behalf of clients in dealings with the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency, Ohio Department of Taxation, Ohio Department of Development, Ohio Department of Health, Ohio Department of Insurance and the Joint Commission on Agency Rule Review
- Representing clients’ interests in government contracting issues with a variety of state agencies and regulatory bodies
- Obtaining modification of state licensure rules to accommodate a client’s unique licensure needs.
- Representing municipalities in successful legislative efforts to restore funding for the Clean Ohio Fund (H.B. 699) and protect local governments’ interests in the enactment of the new Public Records Law (H.B. 9)
Our clients include internationally recognized research hospitals, international corporations, statewide trade associations, regional coalitions of government leaders and other public institutions. In addition, we have represented a steel industry group for more than 15 years as well as a corporate coalition composed of some of Ohio’s most well-known companies on corporate take over issues.
We provide advice on government ethics issues and campaign finance and election law for numerous clients including Fortune 500 companies, nonprofit organizations, and business and trade associations.
Our campaign finance and election law clients include statewide trade associations, international corporations, issue advocacy groups and numerous school districts and municipalities. In this aspect of our practice, we follow the same approach and principles that characterize our lobbying and legislative advocacy efforts – personal attention and a commitment to excellence.