Pictured are Ohio Governor John Kasich, also a candidate for the Republican nomination for president, and Margo Hudson, a Black Clevelander and a recipient, among four others, of Kasich's 2016 courage award

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"I've been all across the United States," said Kasich. "There's no place like Ohio. There's no place like home."

Among five recipients of his prestigious courage award,  Kasich honored Clevelander Margo Hudson, who is Black and a volunteer adult literacy tutor.

A housekeeper employee at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport, Hudson earned her GED in her adult years and was recognized on Wednesday for her community service.

Kaisch's speech comes as Cleveland will host the Republican National Convention this July, and on the heels of his third place finish in the Wisconsin primary on Tuesday.

He treads GOP presidential front runner Donald Trump in delegates, as well as Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, Trump with 703 delegates thus far, Cruz with 507, and Kasich himself garnering, to date, 145 of the 1,237 delegates needed for a GOP candidate to possibly clinch the nomination.

He spoke on an array of issues with emphasis on economic policy agendas and his proposal for changes to the state's tax code.

He said that Ohio is rebounding under his leadership and that he will seek tax relief to lessen the burden on Ohio taxpayers and working families.

The popular two-term governor has a knack, some say, for winning friends across racial and partisan lines, not withstanding strong labor leaders in Ohio that traditionally oppose his policies, and Democratic foes angry over a recently passed state law that he supports that serves to defund Planned Parenthood.

He wants the state income tax ultimately eliminated. To do otherwise, he says, merely drives businesses to other states that do not have an income tax mandate, such as Florida, Texas, Tennessee and Nevada.

A former congressman, Kasich, 64, ousted then Democratic governor Ted Strickland in 2010, and Strickland is now facing Republican U.S. Senate Rob Portman in hopes of unseating him in November, probably the most watched race in Ohio aside from the presidential contest.

A semi-moderate Republican whose campaign tactics are by far more diplomatic than his GOP presidential rivals, Kasich has urged the Ohio General Assembly to cut the state’s income tax rate by 23 percent and to eliminate it altogether for small business owners, initiatives that are part of his overall plan to cut taxes by $500 million over a two- year period.

The two-year, $71.2 billion state operating budget adopted by the state legislature took effect July 1 and does not reflect an increase in taxes.

Ohio is a pivotal state for presidential elections and Cuyahoga County, which includes the majority Black city of Cleveland and 58 other municipalities, townships or villages, is the largest of 88 counties statewide, and a Democratic stronghold. And Kasich, like all of the presidential wannabees, both Republicans and Democrats alike, has courted the Black vote relative to his bid for the White House.

Blacks, both statewide and nationally, are not at parity with Whites, whether its jobs, education or the manner in which they are treated or mistreated by the nation's legal system.