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Mentoring groups warn funding cuts in House and Senate drafts would leave thousands on waiting lists
Summary
Big Brothers Big Sisters representatives told the Senate Finance Committee that recent budget drafts cut TANF funding for their statewide mentoring work, which would leave more than 1,000 children without mentors over two years.
Stephanie Hightower of the Columbus Urban League, speaking for Big Brothers Big Sisters affiliates across Ohio, urged senators to restore TANF funding the DeWine administration had included for mentoring.
"Since 2014, Big Brothers Big Sisters has received $1,000,000 per fiscal year in TANF funds to support mentoring across Ohio," Hightower told the Senate Finance Committee. She said the House cut the allocation in half and the Senate version removed it entirely, and that without the dollars "over a thousand children statewide go without a mentor over the next two years."
Hightower said the network serves about 6,000 children statewide and maintains a waiting list of more than 2,000 children; the Central Ohio affiliate acts as a fiscal agent for 17 affiliates across the state. She described research findings on mentoring outcomes and asked the General Assembly to keep the FY2026‑27 appropriation in place.
Senators asked whether the program would shut down without state funding; Hightower said programs would continue to operate but at lower capacity and would not reach children on waiting lists. Committee members also clarified that the Central Ohio agency acts as fiscal agent for statewide affiliates and that the loss of TANF funds would reverberate to local programs throughout Ohio.
No formal vote occurred. The request was a straightforward budget ask to restore a $1 million per fiscal year TANF line item for mentoring services that the witness said produces measurable long‑term benefits for youth and workforce outcomes.
