From The Columbus Dispatch As reporters awaited the release of records, Ohio Gov. John Kasich said today that state officials still believe the former school-choice director acted alone in scrubbing the data of some charter school sponsors to falsely inflate their grades.
David Hansen resigned from the Ohio Department of Education in July after it was discovered he manipulated the evaluations of some tax-funded, privately operated schools to make their sponsors appear to be succeeding.
Ohio’s major newspapers, including The Dispatch, waited six weeks for the department to release emails and other records which officials have contended show that Hansen acted alone in fixing the grades.
Hansen is the husband of Beth Hansen, Kasich’s chief of staff in the governor’s office until she left to manage the Republican’s presidential campaign.
“There’s going to be a release at some point here ... it’s coming soon,” Kasich said just hours before the release.
“The department is in the middle trying to make sure we have all the accurate data released,” Kasich said at a Statehouse question-and-answer session that followed an economic-development announcement.