Governor’s Property Tax Working Group Votes to Issue Recommendations
Governor’s Property Tax Working Group Votes to Issue Recommendations
The final report adopted by Gov. Mike DeWine's Property Tax Reform Working Group encompasses 20 recommendations for consideration, including expanding the homestead exemption or implementing a property tax circuit breaker, restricting the use of emergency levies and overhauling levy ballot language. The report follows months of meetings by the 11-member group formed by Gov. Mike DeWine as a cross section of former lawmakers, local elected officials, and school superintendents.
"It's really been a valuable experience to have people at the local elected level to provide their perspectives on this because you guys are the ones who are both the beneficiaries of property taxes and the individuals in charge of administering it," Co-Chair Bill Seitz, former township trustee and legislator, said. "I think that's a perspective the Legislature needs to hear."
Recommendations issued by the work group include:
- "Refining" the role of county budget commissions, including by allowing them to reduce levies they deem unnecessary or excessive and to review and reject levies placed on the ballot by county-wide non-elected entities.
- Reviewing and evaluating property tax exemptions regularly.
- Limiting carry over balances for all taxing districts to 100%.
- Implementing an inflation cap for school districts on the 20-mill floor, including inside millage
- Eliminating future substitute levies and renaming all current substitute and emergency levies as "fixed-sum levies," with all future such levies to apply to the 20-mill floor.
- Closing the so-called LLC loophole when buying or selling residential and agricultural property.
- Limiting emergency levies to entities under fiscal caution, watch or emergency as defined by the auditor of state and imposing a five-year time limit.
- Establishing a new work group to analyze efficiencies among various levels of government.
- Allowing county commissioners to review and potentially reject levies proposed by non-elected countywide entities.
- Codifying limits to the creation of Residential Stability Zones wherein homeowners can review partial property tax exemptions.
A copy of the full report, which includes all 20 recommendation, may be viewed HERE.