Tax revaluations spur grassroots backlash
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By Andrew Tobias | Signal Statehouse
OHIO – Gerald Bruce may have lost the first battle in his effort to radically overhaul Ohio’s system of assessing and collecting property taxes.
But the 64-year-old Groveport maintenance worker isn’t giving up his crusade – the first step of which involves trying to personally get 1,000 voters to sign his petition for a constitutional amendment that, among other things, would cap a property’s taxable value until it’s transferred or sold.
“I don’t go around to houses now, especially after dark. Some people just are really jumpy,” Bruce said.
I’m interested in Bruce’s story not because I think he’s likely to succeed but because I’m keeping an eye on broader grassroots efforts focused on property taxes and the real-world impact of property-tax increases.
There’s an ongoing property tax revaluation happening in phases around the state, which will be the first since the low interest rates of the 2020 coronavirus pandemic helped send home values skyrocketing. That means that, depending on where they live, Ohio property owners are likely to see significant increases in their tax bills soon, if they haven’t already.
Around 12 people – representing several different anti-property tax groups from the Cleveland and Cincinnati areas – held a rally at the Ohio Statehouse on Wednesday, calling on lawmakers to either reform property tax laws or eliminate them altogether.
We’re going to become a voting bloc, I know it. This is changing across the country … We’ve been mad by ourselves for far too long.
Sarah Wolf of Cincinnati
There are a bunch of bills pending in the Ohio legislature to limit property taxes. Some apply to certain groups – like military widows or senior citizens – while others are more broad. Some would require the state to pay to offset property tax hikes while others would reduce revenue for schools and other local government entities.
There’s even a proposal from lawmakers to amend the state constitution – which would require voter approval – to freeze annual tax increases at 4 percent. This proposal got its first committee hearing on Tuesday, roughly six months after it was introduced.
The bills seem unlikely to pass, given the disagreement over whether state or local government should foot the bill, so to speak. But I’ll be writing more on this topic soon.
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