Welcome to The Sound of Ideas from Ideastream Public Media.

I'm Stephanie Haney.

Thank you for being with us.

Ohio's property taxes generate about $24 billion each year, helping pay for things like public schools, parks, and police departments, among many other local services.

But homeowners have been feeling pinched lately as some counties have seen double-digit increases in property valuations, leading to higher taxes for some.

That has led to calls for reform, with one group hoping to eliminate property taxes entirely, with eyes now on the 2027 ballot after failing to get a constitutional amendment proposal on this November's ballot.

Ideastream Public Media has been going to public libraries and community events this summer all across Northeast Ohio to learn about the issues that are driving people to vote.

And we've heard over and over again that property taxes are a key issue at the top of voters' minds.

That's why our newsroom recently took a week-long deep dive into the issue called Ideastream Explores Property Taxes.

Today, we're going to highlight some of that reporting.

We'll learn about legislative reform efforts, how property taxes impact Ohio's farmers, and what would happen if funding for important resources like libraries and parks changed.

That's coming your way on this special edition of The Sound of Ideas.

First, we'll learn more about the controversial movement to eliminate property taxes in the state.

Here's Statehouse News Bureau Chief Karen Kastler.

It's a sunny Saturday morning in the parking lot of a shutdown TGI Friday's restaurant off I-70 in Reynoldsburg.

Sue Mazzarini is under a tent that threatens to blow away in the breeze, armed with pens and plenty of petitions for people to sign.

Trent Martin of Grove City in Franklin County did.

I signed because, you know, there's just no control at all over the property taxes.

They just keep increasing, increasing, increasing.

Since I bought my house 10 years ago, my property taxes have went up over $600 a month.

So there's just no control over how long it'll be.

I'm retired, so there's no control over how long it'll be until I won't be able to afford to keep my house.

So did Kelly Nichols, who lives nearby in Fairfield County.

I'm frustrated.

I mean, they just reassessed my property last year.

And then in Pickerington, they tried to raise another 1% sales tax to again fund the schools, and, you know, that got voted down.

I think people are just they're tired of the property taxes constantly being used and misused by our, by our school systems.

Some signers share stories and anecdotes about senior citizens on fixed incomes not being able to keep up with soaring property taxes.

That's one reason Candace Mitchell of Columbus signed.

I will say I am a little sad.

I wouldn't say mad.

I have neighbors that were an older couple.

The wife had purchased the house from her father.

It had been in their family pretty much her whole entire life.

She passed away.

The husband wasn't able to keep up with the property taxes and they took it.

The state took it.

So he was misplaced and it's just a really bad situation all around.

And I it just hurt my heart to see that happen to them.

The all-volunteer group started last year with no real organization.

Now there are 11 regions, each covering 8 counties.

Sue Mazzarini says she's done several pop-ups like this one on the Franklin-Fairfield County line and gets about 80 people each time.

It's really funny when some of them get out of their cars, they are power walking over to us and you go, oh, you look like you're on a mission.

And they go, yes, we want to sign.

Where do we sign?

Where do we sign?

And it used to be when we first started this, You had to have more of a conversation.

What are we going to do to replace?

What are we going to do to this?

And now they are so frustrated, at wit's end.

About $24 billion in property tax revenue was raised last year by levies approved by local voters for schools, first responders, libraries, children's services, agencies on mental health and aging, zoos, and other local services.

But there's suspicion of whether all that money is needed.

Derek Whiting is among those with questions.

The Columbus father of 10 says he's worried about soaring rents and wants to know where all the money goes.

I really feel like they cheating us.

I'm gonna just be honest.

So it's so much more they got.

Like I said, we come on now.

If marijuana is legal, where that money going?

That's that's a lot of money.

Then they already cut all the school programs anyways.

Where's all of this money going?

I mean, we can probably get in there and really look for it, but we ain't gonna really find it.

Breakdowns of tax levy distribution are included in bills mailed to homeowners by county treasurers and on most counties' websites.

That levy money doesn't include the $70 million collected in the first year of taxes on legalized marijuana because state law directs it to communities with dispensaries and other specific funds.

The Ohio Lottery is also often singled out as a source of potential revenue since all profits go to education.

It brought in $1.4 billion in profits last year, around 12% of the state's total K-12 education spending.

Many signers say there's a better way than property taxes to raise the money for police, EMS, teachers, and local services, but aren't sure what that is.

Others suggest hiking the state sales tax, which officials have said would have to more than triple to around 20%, and that would hit lower-income Ohioans especially hard.

State lawmakers have said they've passed reforms to lower tax bills and have more coming.

Donna Anderson has been holding signs directing traffic to the parking lot.

It's her first day on the job as a volunteer, and she says those Those who respond are trying to send a message to those lawmakers.

I think they haven't listened.

The legislators haven't listened to us so far, and maybe if we get enough signatures, they'll finally take notice and really listen to the people.

People want this.

People are tired of the data centers.

They're tired of the property taxes, and if we could get them to at least take notice and say, hey, there's a powerful group out here that are lobbying for this.

Maybe we can get them to lower our taxes in some way.

I just hope it happens.

Well, lawmakers will tell you that they are doing that, that they've taken They haven't.

They're really not, 'cause I've been watching 'em.

They need to listen a little better.

Though property taxes are locally approved, collected, and distributed, priorities in state spending spending often come up, such as the $600 million for the Cleveland Browns' domed stadium in Brook Park.

The state budget actually directed that money to come from unclaimed funds, but a court battle is holding that up, and lawmakers may have to find that money another way.

Axe Ohio Tax volunteers plan more signing events at businesses, outside big events, and even at people's homes.

Mazzarini said 97 people signed petitions at this event.

And she plans to be back in this parking lot on the next 2 Saturdays.

Ideastream's Statehouse News Bureau Chief Karen Kastler joins us now to talk more about the Axe Ohio tax movement and legislative reform efforts.

Karen, thank you for joining us by video from Columbus.

Hey, great to be here.

If you would like to join this conversation, you can call us at 866-578-0903.

You can also email us at soi@ideastream.org or send us a message on Instagram @thesoundofideas.

Now, Karen, in your piece that we just played there, you spoke with a lot of homeowners and some of them were saying their property taxes went up over $600 a month.

One anecdote mentioned the state taking a home from an older couple due to rising property taxes.

What do you make of the growing support for Axe Ohio Tax, which began only about a year ago?

Well, I don't know how much actual support this movement does have because they did not collect the signatures that they needed to put this amendment on the ballot this year.

And they needed around 414,000 valid signatures, which means they probably needed to collect around 700,000 signatures, and they weren't able to do that.

So I'm not sure about the popularity of the idea of signing a petition to ask voters to completely eliminate property taxes.

But there's no question that people are concerned about property taxes.

They're very frustrated, and they don't think lawmakers are doing enough, even though levies are locally approved, collected, and distributed, they feel like they're just not getting they're paying too much.

So the Axe Ohio Tax movement did not succeed, as you mentioned, in getting the signatures needed to get on the ballot in November.

Is it that simple?

Is that all that the constitutional amendment would have done is just ban property taxes?

Is there any more to it than that?

That's the it's very simple.

That's all that it would do is abolish property taxes.

It would not come up with a funding mechanism to fill that $24 billion hole that would be created if all local property taxes were eliminated.

And I should mention in the piece there, one of the people I spoke to talked about how her sales tax there was a sales tax proposal on the ballot, and she said that would fund the schools.

It's important to note sales tax do not fund schools.

Sales taxes do not fund schools.

Schools are funded by property taxes, and they're also funded in some districts by income taxes.

And so that's the question for a lot of folks.

Even people who signed this petition have wondered what do you do to continue to fund schools, law enforcement, libraries, all sorts of state or all sorts of local agencies?

What do you do to support those if you don't have property taxes to pay for those?

And nobody seems to have that answer.

And this effort, it is ongoing.

Is it something that we should anticipate seeing potentially on the 2027 ballot?

Well, they say that they're continuing their progress and they can keep the signatures they've already gathered over the last year or so.

However, the longer you wait to submit signatures for validation, the more likely it is that your signatures are going to get thrown out because people move, people die, that sort of thing.

You have to have only valid signatures to submit.

But there's also going to be a huge pushback here if indeed they get close to the ballot or they make the ballot.

You've got a group of about 65 local leaders, libraries, business groups, union groups that have come together to send a message that this is a terrible idea, that eliminating property taxes completely would cause massive job loss and Ohio would lead to the destruction of local services.

And you also have some state lawmakers, most state lawmakers, as a matter of fact, who would be coming out saying this is a terrible idea.

So if it does make the ballot next year, there's going to be a huge campaign to stop it.

Ideastream Public Media's education reporter Connor Morris talked about how voters only approved about 1/3 of school levies this May.

You mentioned there was some confusion among the people that you talked to about how schools are funded and what could happen there with mention of sales tax.

Well, that compared to 2/3 of school levies passed the previous year based on Connor's reporting.

Did you hear a lot of frustration about money going to schools and other services when you were talking with Axe Ohio tax supporters?

Well, I think it really does show how confusing school funding is for people because they know there are local property taxes.

They also know that the state is involved in some way.

But there's this question, do sales taxes go to support public schools.

The lottery, that is supposed to go to support public schools.

What about marijuana money?

You heard some of that in that package.

But those things do have direct destinations for that money.

Marijuana money does not go in any way to schools.

It goes to very specific things that were outlined in the law that Ohioans voted on.

And when it comes to property tax levies, I talked to some school leaders after this last round of levies in May, and they say that 75% of the renewal levies on the ballot passed, which is consistent with what they've seen, that renewal levies pass 75 to 80% of the time.

New funding requests are the ones that fail quite often.

They fail 70 to 80% of the time.

So school officials are not terribly concerned about the numbers that they saw in May because they say it's consistent.

But obviously school leaders are concerned about the property tax question and what's going to happen long term.

And these are people that also live in communities with all of us.

So they pay property taxes just like we do.

So obviously they're concerned on a personal level as well.

Let's talk a little bit about what is happening in the State House.

What have lawmakers in the State House said about ideas that could replace property taxes, like sales tax, for example?

Well, nobody's talking about replacing property taxes totally because of that $24 billion hole that it would create.

So we haven't heard any lawmakers I think there's been one bill that might suggest eliminating property taxes, but a lot of lawmakers who came in saying this is a good idea are really kind of pulling back on that because of the impact it would have on local services.

And those local governments would be either raising taxes dramatically, cutting services dramatically, or coming to the state for help.

So if this gets to the ballot, you're going to see some state lawmakers, Republicans and Democrats, pushing back on that.

The most recent budget correction bill did have a one-time credit on the homestead tax exemption, which reduces property taxes for older and disabled Ohioans.

It was only a one-time credit, though and so it'll show up on homeowners, certain homeowners' bills this time, but it won't going forward.

And so that's the question is how do you move forward and have property tax relief that goes long term?

The legislature has been primarily focused on income taxes and lowering income taxes, but they still said they've heard more about property taxes than anything else.

The only bill that I think that has been proposed that would be really kind of a big change would be Republican Senator Andrew Brenner's bill.

It would replace local school property taxes with a single statewide $20 mil property tax.

It would also increase the sales tax by 1.75%, bringing the total state sales tax to 7.5%.

That doesn't include local taxes Now, this bill hasn't moved at all, but it's one of the ideas that some lawmakers are at least considering, though Brenner did not win his primary, so he won't be back.

But this is, you know, kind of, I guess, a direction that could that lawmakers could go.

And we should note that if there were to be an increase in sales tax, if that were to be something that supplements or maybe even replaces property tax in, in the future, that it is something that would disproportionately impact lower-income people because those people would be then paying the same percentage of sales tax but coming from a smaller pool of income to do that.

Now let's talk about Absolutely.

And go ahead.

No, I was just gonna say absolutely.

And that's in some of the criticisms about the abolish the property tax movement.

There's been this claim that it's actually that sales tax that is really the most regressive because everybody does have to pay it and property taxes work considered at one time to be more fair because people who were wealthier had homes that were more highly valued, and so they paid more.

But now you're seeing these home values increase dramatically.

Some of the volunteers that were talking about raising signatures were saying this was a way to get lawmakers to pay attention and they didn't feel heard, these people from the Axe Ohio Tax movement, and then pushed back when you did mention that there were steps that were being taken at the Statehouse.

Can you talk more about what lawmakers say about their continuing efforts?

I know you just mentioned some of the things that are happening there, but is this something that they are kind of satisfied with what they've done, or is there more work to come here from the lawmakers?

Well, both.

They're satisfied with what they've done because they say that they've done billions of dollars in property tax relief.

But they say that there's more work ahead.

We do have a session that will start sometime after the election, the lame duck session, where property taxes could be a big issue, especially as lawmakers look to election results and see how the campaigns have addressed property taxes and frankly, whoever wins the governor's race will have a role in this as well.

But lawmakers say that they've passed bills that cap the growth of property taxes, change the way property tax formula can be applied.

But you've got homeowners, including some that were in the story that I put up here, that say that they just haven't seen it.

They don't feel like lawmakers have truly listened.

And I don't know exactly what they're looking for from state lawmakers in terms of property tax relief, but they're not getting it.

And so that leads some to say, well, let's just burn the whole thing down and abolish property taxes entirely.

But doing that, we'd be the only state that would have ever done that.

And it would really leave devastation for those local services as they try to figure out how they would continue to operate, how you would continue to have police and fire in your communities and EMS, how you would continue to have public schools, libraries, other entities.

How would things keep funded.

And again, the whole idea of a sales tax going up dramatically, some people say that they're okay with that.

But that's a big, huge increase that would put us, I think, the highest property or the highest sales tax in the country, or at least one of them.

And it would really ruin the economy for our communities that were on the borders in Ohio, because people would just go across the border to do their shopping.

If you're just joining us here on The Sound of Ideas, we are talking about property taxes.

On the heels of our nation or of our newsroom-wide coverage on property taxes.

The number to call if you want to be a part of the conversation is 866-578-0903.

You can also email us at soi@ideastream.org or send us a message on Instagram @TheSoundOfIdeas.

We have a call now from Thomas in Parma Heights.

Thomas, welcome to The Sound of Ideas.

Please go ahead.

Good morning, and thank you for this series.

I've been following it carefully.

And you've done a good job.

I'm a retired government teacher, and I got to keep this short, but I want to refocus.

And I think what I would say is, think of the song, We're Looking for Love in All the Wrong Places.

Um, we when I was a government teacher, I taught federalism, which means that it was the relationship between the local, the state, and the federal government.

And so I think that the trillion-dollar war budget is something we could look at.

That's in the news all the time now.

And, um, a guy named Seymour Melman in the '80s wrote a book called The Permanent War Economy, and he made the point if we brought the money home from the wars, we could fund public services.

And so let's You can't solve this today, but I want you to think about it and do a future program on this.

The money is there.

It's in the federal budget, in the war economy, and in the trillion-dollar war budget.

If just a fraction of that money came home, we wouldn't be talking about property taxes.

We would be funding the schools very well.

So that's what I want the people who have been doing this wonderful program to expand to federalism.

And the elephant in the room is the trillion-dollar war budget.

Thank you.

Thank you for the comment, Thomas, in Parma Heights.

We appreciate it very much.

Karen, as we wrap things up here, I want to ask you what we can expect from the candidates for governor.

Both of them released ideas for property tax reform if they were to win, Dr.

Amy Acton and Vivek Ramaswamy.

So what can you tell us about that?

Well, I do want to address one of Thomas's points here in that it shows how important state and local elections are, because while he's absolutely You're absolutely right that the federal budget for the Defense Department is enormous, and that money arguably could be used in different ways.

But it's really that property taxes and those who are deciding on them are elected at the state and local level.

So I always remind people that your state and local government is much more in touch with you and your needs and your daily concerns than the federal government typically is.

But what we've heard from Republican Vivek Ramaswamy and Democrat Amy Acton, they've talked a little bit about property taxes.

I mean, Ramaswamy started his campaign on day one saying he was going to eliminate property taxes.

He's rolled that back a bit, saying now he wants to roll back property taxes to pre-pandemic levels.

But he really hasn't been very clear about what that means and how he would accomplish that, what kind of changes would have to happen.

It's really unclear how he would make that happen and what the timeline of that would be.

And then Amy Acton, her proposal is much more targeted.

She's talking about targeted cuts for, you know, say, raising the homestead tax exemption, the income limit so that more people would qualify for that.

More older and disabled Ohioans would qualify for that.

She'd also create something like a circuit breaker, which is a bill that's been proposed several times at the Statehouse that would trigger a rebate or a tax cut for individual homeowners when their property tax bill increases by a certain percentage.

And so her idea would tie income to that as well.

And she would say that there'd be about a $1,000 credit potentially for people whose property tax bills went up more than 4%.

There's another part of her plan that would require the state fully fund the Fair School Funding Plan, which the state moved away from in the last budget.

That's potentially the most expensive thing here because Policy Matters Ohio, which is a progressive think tank, estimates that not fully funding the Fair School Funding Plan in the last budget was about a $2.75 billion package that was not done.

So that would be money that the state would then come up with to fully fund her plan as she's got it out there.

So we wait to hear more from both of these candidates.

About specifics on what they would do, because obviously property taxes are still a concern and homeowners and even renters are really getting frustrated.

Sure.

Ideastream Statehouse News Bureau Chief Karen Kastler joining us from Columbus.

Thank you very much for continuing to cover this issue.

We appreciate it.

Great to be here.

We are continuing with our special Sound of Ideas episode on property taxes from Ideastream Public Media.

I'm Stephanie Haney.

Thank you for staying with us.

We just heard about homeowners who are fed up with property taxes and learned about reform efforts being talked about in Columbus.

But now we'll learn about how rising property taxes are impacting a distinct group of landowners farmers.

Ideastream's engaged journalism reporter Richard Cunningham reported on how farmers are faring in today's economic landscape.

He joins us in studio now.

Richard, welcome.

Thanks so much for having me.

Also, we have Bill Patterson, a name most people in Northeast Ohio should very well know, co-owner of the famous Patterson Farms and president of the Ohio Farm Bureau.

Bill, welcome.

Welcome.

Thanks, Stephanie.

Thanks for having me.

If you would like to be a part of this conversation about property taxes and farming, you can call us at 866-578-0903.

You can also email us at soi@ideastream.org, or you can message us on Instagram @thesoundofideas.

Now, Bill, you are the 6th generation of a 7-generation farm in Geauga County.

You also represent farmers across the state as president of the Ohio Farm Bureau, as we just mentioned.

This is a tough time for farmers financially.

Can you tell us Because tariffs are a factor that's been at play in your industry.

Yeah, we have several headwinds in agriculture right now.

And one of the things Farm Bureau is looking at is making sure that farm, you know, the farm economy, the agricultural economy, rural Ohio economy stay strong because, you know, the only way to keep people farming, keep people fed is to make sure that the farm economy is strong.

And so there are several headwinds.

There's, there's high input costs that has in part to do, you know, with the war with Iran, the tariffs, as well as residual from the last number of years where there was already heavy pressure on those inputs.

There's, you know, the expense of things in general is high.

And the price that we get for, you know, for the commodities, for corn, soybean, et cetera, is low, lower than, you know, lower than the recent 20 years historical average.

So we're facing multiple headwinds.

And we want to just make sure that we understand all of these issues to make sure that we can make a good effort to make sure that the farm economy remains strong.

Sure.

And as we have been talking about property taxes, now let's talk about that piece and how that's impacting farming.

Richard's report says that Ohio farmers' property taxes have risen tenfold since 2005 for farmers.

Can you talk about how farmers are taxed when it comes to property, which is different from homeowners and businesses?

Yes.

In the mid-'70s, due to a good partnership between conservationists and agriculture and basically the general general population of Ohio, we passed what was called CAUV as a constitutional amendment.

That's Current Agricultural Use Valuation.

It's probably the most single most significant tool that agriculture and Ohio has to create and retain farmland and green space as a whole.

And what that does is it values farmland for what the farmland produces.

So it utilizes the price of corn, the price of soybeans, it utilizes the input costs.

So when there's rising input It uses the cost to borrow money, so the capital cost to be able to borrow money and acquire land.

It utilizes those all into a formula.

It utilizes the quality of the soil, so how much can that soil how much, you know, crop can that soil create.

And so it creates different soils, have different levels, and it creates an amount of land that reflects the value of the land for farming purposes.

Okay, thank you for breaking that down for us.

Now, Richard, you spoke with other farmers about the CAUV, like 5th-generation farmer Jay Pickering, who says the application process can be kind of tricky.

Tell us what you learned there.

Yeah, so speaking with Jay Pickering, he's a farmer out in Avon in Lorain County.

He says that there's a little bit of bureaucracy that comes with this program.

A big problem is that everything has to be filled out on paper, right?

It's not electronic.

You have to actually, actually fill out the forms and send it in through the mail.

And a big problem with that is that in Lorain County, for Jay, he says that is that you don't really get a notification if you send it off and they've received it.

You only get a notification if something is wrong with your application.

So farmers will fill out this application, send it in to their local farm bureaus, and they won't have any kind of feedback from the county at that end.

And also there's a lot of red tape that you have to jump through to make sure that your land is eligible, right?

I talked to Jay about this and he says a big issue for him a couple of years ago was he applied and one of his acres wasn't counted towards the CAUB program saw his property tax bill jump by $7,000.

And that's just 1 acre out of 12 acres.

So imagine if, you know, they didn't get the form or the entire form was wrong, you could imagine what his property bill could have looked like.

And so he had to spend thousands out of pocket with lawyers and surveyors to make sure that they could get that acre of land counted back.

So there's a lot of administrative problems with this program.

Do we know anything about the processing time, how long it takes from application to actually get the response?

From talking to Jay, it could it kind of varies from county to county, right?

Counties that have a bigger portion of rural, like, resources, right, towards these farmers, towards farmers and this program, they might have quicker reaction times than smaller counties who might not have as much administration towards this.

Okay.

Bill, do you think there needs to be more legislative reform to help ease the burden on farmers?

So one of, one of the things I was going to mention, I appreciate, uh, Mr.

Pickering's, uh, concerns.

There is some legislation brought forward by Representative Thomas and Representative Peterson that will address some of those issues, creates accountability, creates clarity, which is the biggest thing that agriculture needs.

As you think, we're 6th generation for a 7th generation farm.

I'm 6th generation.

If we're going to keep having generations come back to the farm, we need to understand and what the playing field's going to look like.

And so the bill that they've brought forward really addresses a lot of the concerns, allows for, you know, you don't need to apply every single year when you have the same things.

It looks at how we value different pieces of farmland, and it creates a statewide template.

You know, we really struggle because in Farm Bureau, our members, one of, one of our die-hard things is local control.

We want local control.

At the same We want things evenly applied across the state.

And so we certainly appreciate those auditors that really understand the program and are willing to share their knowledge across the state.

So there are some legislative fixes.

We do very much appreciate very recently that the tax commission sort of came by with some tweaks to the CAUV formula.

What was created in 1975 as a concept was applied differently in 1975 than it is today.

And so the way we look at certain farmlands and certain farm byproducts of farmland, so roads and barns and facilities, and is different today than it was then.

So we appreciate the fact that we can continue to interpret it to reflect current agricultural practices.

That's been very important.

And that's one thing where Farm Bureau really shines.

Farm Bureau comes out there, speaks for all 60,000 farm family members that we have as a consistent voice to the text to make sure that that's being applied in a way that's consistent with what the voters approved in the mid-'70s.

Richard, in your reporting, you talked with economist Howard Fleeter.

What did Howard say about what would be helpful for farmers?

Yeah, so for this piece I spoke with Howard.

He's an economist based in Columbus focusing on tax policy and public finance, and one thing he explained to me is that for these tax assessments, they come every 3 years, and that 3 years you don't really hear back from the administration.

So you can see your tax bill jump a big amount within 3 years and you had no clue where that money was coming from.

And so he had a suggestion of maybe instead of those tax assessments coming after every 3 years, maybe they come annually.

So the way he explained it to me was if at the end of 3 years you see a tax bill jump, say, 30%, would it be easier for farmers to see that 10% come at the end of every year?

That way they could plan, like Bill said, and have that clarity beforehand and be able to expect that bill to jump up by 10%, or would it be better for them to get that assessment at the end of 3 years?

Now again, this was rhetorical.

He hasn't done a lot of research into this yet, but it could be an idea to help reduce the blow and the impact of property tax jumps.

As I'm thinking through this and I'm thinking how that math would work, that sounds like paying more money if you get those incremental increases because you would have those 3 years of paying that lower value, but then you have the 30% increase.

Increase.

Just something to think about as we kind of figure out what is the future of property taxes.

Bill, we did just hear Karen Kastler talk about people who have signed on to a movement called Axe Ohio Tax to ban property taxes in the state of Ohio.

What do you think of that idea?

Well, as I was, you know, I just had some information here to reflect and I put it there and I put the big thing that I wrote on top here is member.

And at the end of the day, it comes down to our members.

And we are grassroots, a pure grassroots organization.

Our members get together every year and vote on policy.

And in December, with significant 380 delegates representing our 60,000 members in a room, and they spoke very loudly that they were not in favor of the outright elimination of property taxes.

We're also very much in favor of reviewing the current tax situation.

I mean, there's 4 main buckets of taxes that are coming in there, and it's a balance of where those different taxes can be.

And if one gets out of whack, we feel it, and that's what you're feeling right now.Is one has sort of gotten out of whack with the rest of the world, and we have to make sure that we can figure out how to do that.

And I wanna really applaud Representative Dave Thomas.

I just mentioned him a moment ago.

There is 2 commissions that were put in place in 2024 and 2025.

They did great work and they came out with some recommendations and nothing necessarily occurred on the back end of those recommendations.

And David Thomas said, and other legislators in the state said, we're gonna get this done.

We're gonna address the concerns we have.

And if you've gone to the mailbox in the past week, or some maybe still be coming, you know, I got my tax bill, it was 12% less than it was before as a result of the 4 bills, specifically the 4 bills that were passed in December.

And really the full effect is not going to occur to the end of the year.

So we do think that those legislators are listening.

We do think that they're reacting to that movement to say this is out of whack, we need you to do something about it.

And they're saying we're going to get it done.

We appreciate the work that's happening.

We appreciate a handful of the bills that are still in the pipeline right now to be able to get that done.

And we think that the process is working.

We think there's a lot of work to still be done.

And we do think that we need to look at those 4 pools of dollars, where they come from and how we can best still affect our local expenses, right?

And we have local expenses and property taxes is probably the best, most local way for us to express our opinion of how our leaders should be spending their money.

And so we think it's a very important part of things.

Things.

But we do realize that the whole thing needs to be fixed and we appreciate the work being done.

You mentioned Representative Dave Thomas in the Ohio legislature.

We did have him on The Sound of Ideas on the Monday, July 20th episode in case anyone would like to go back and find that and watch and listen to that.

Richard, what did other farmers like Jay Pickering think about abolishing property taxes?

Well, speaking with Jay, he says he is not in favor of abolishing the property taxes.

He says these are lifelines for especially smaller counties.

To have fire, to have police officers, and especially for schools all over the state of Ohio.

So for Jay Pritzker especially, abolishing property taxes is not in his plan.

However, he does think that the state could take a bigger tax excuse me, a bigger portion of the tax bill.

So that could be through state taxes or income taxes, raising those taxes in order to fund schools and for fire and police in smaller counties.

Again, we haven't seen much of that happen.

Happen on the legislative level, but it is an idea that people are proposing.

If you are just joining us here on The Sound of Ideas, we are talking about property taxes on the heels of our newsroom-wide initiative, Ideastream Explores Property Taxes.

If you want to be a part of the conversation, the number to call is 866-578-0903.

You can also email us at soi@ideastream.org or send us a message on Instagram @TheSoundOfIdeas.

Marvin emailed in with this comment: I think we need to stop basing property tax increases on unrealized value increases.

That's what forces people to sell their homes.

We all know if we can afford the taxes when we buy the property at the sale price, so it's fair to use that.

But when it comes to increases, it should be based on what the owner has the ability to pay.

Marvin, thank you very much for that comment.

And now I'd like to thank our guests for being with us here.

Bill Patterson, co-owner of Patterson Farms and president of the Ohio Farm Bureau, thank you for being with us.

Thank you very much for having us.

Also with us are Richard Cunningham, Ideastream's engaged journalism reporter.

Richard, thank you very much.

Thanks so much.

We're closing out our Sound of Ideas special on property taxes from Ideastream Public Media.

I'm Stephanie Haney.

Thank you for staying with us.

Today we've learned about the landowners who are being affected by property tax hikes and people who want to see reform or even abolishment, but that could be devastating to the vast public services that rely on property taxes to fund their operations, including schools, parks, local governments, and libraries.

Libraries these days provide much more than book rentals.

They provide career training, free food support, and internet for communities without access Ideastream Public Media's Senior Arts Culture Reporter Kabir Bhatia has more.

Right now I'm on the steps of the Main Branch Cleveland Public Library downtown.

This is a great spot to come out and sit when I want to eat or when I want to introduce a new segment.

But what do you think would happen if right in the middle of my meal I just lost half my sandwich?

That's what Ohio's libraries have been wondering lately.

The Cleveland Library System gets about 55% of its revenue from local property taxes.

Ask around, and that's about the same take as other library systems in Northeast Ohio.

One of the most disconcerting aspects of that proposition is the lack of any alternate funding source.

In Medina County, the library system has 6 branches and an annual circulation of about 3 million items.

The talk of eliminating property taxes is alarming for Medina Library Executive Director Julianne Beadle.

But when I go home at night and living in Medina County, I worry about my police and fire and my school district.

It kind of blows my mind to think about pulling the rug out of local government, including public libraries, right?

Medina's library spends about 60% of its budget on operating expenses, the same amount it receives from property taxes.

If property tax levies go away, Beadle says the library would have to make major cuts.

Number of branches that we could keep open, the number of books that we could do, the number of people we can employ.

It's not that I don't think that property taxes need to be reformed or looked at.

It's that I think it needs to be done in a thoughtful manner with time to make sure that we can manage consequences.

Ohio's libraries are already reeling from cuts to the state's public library fund.

Funded by a special fund instituted in 2025.

In Medina, that accounted for 40% of the budget, and the same goes for the Tuscarawas County Public Library.

Ohio libraries do not benefit from any county sales tax, city income tax, school district income tax, casino or marijuana income tax.

The revenues that public libraries receive are from the state and from local property taxes.

Of the $24 billion collected from Ohio property owners each year, only about 2.5% goes to public libraries, according to the Ohio Library Council.

But cutting that, according to Michelle McMorro-Ramsell, director of the Tuscarawas Library System, would be, quote, devastating.

We're in a rural area here in Tuscarawas County.

There are areas of our community that it's not about not having money, it's that they don't have internet access.

They'll use a meeting room and borrow one of our laptops so that they can take their online test or so that they can do a job interview.

Ramsell says one-on-one services that library staff provide will suffer the most.

People who need to apply for Social Security and they need to do it online, or unemployment and they've never done that, they don't have an email address.

Of course, less revenue could mean fewer books to check out too.

For families that are trying to make sure that their kids are ready for kindergarten and they're wanting them to read 1,000 books before kindergarten.

Who has 1,000 books in their home?

Who can afford to buy 1,000 books?

Not too many people.

But they can come to a public library and check those out.

Ohio's public libraries get some of their funding from grants and donations.

But about 80% of them rely on property tax levies.

And Ohio voters have been supporting those levies levies.

In 2026, 14 library systems had levies on the ballot, and 12 of them passed.

In 2025, 18 of 20 passed.

So as petitions circulate to abolish the property taxes, do voters know that that includes public libraries?

I think that in general we hear and see a lot of misinformation, a lot of opinion masquerading as fact, and so absolutely maybe not having a good working knowledge of how the taxes are approved and how they're divided.

Thanks for coming along for this lesson about how Ohio's libraries are funded.

Now, full disclosure, I was once a trustee here at the Hudson Library, and they get 70% of their funding from property tax levies.

Joining me now in studio to talk more about how libraries depend on property tax funding, we have Kabir Bhatia, our Senior Arts Culture Reporter.

Kabir, welcome.

Thanks for having me.

And here to talk about the funding that parks rely on, we have Zaria Johnson, our Environmental Reporter.

Zaria, good morning.

Thanks for being here.

Now, Kabir, you reported the piece that we just played with help from our Multimedia Journalist Ygal Kaufman and found that some library systems get as much as 60 or 70% of their budget from property taxes.

So how concerned are library leaders that their funding could be affected with reform or even abolishment, and then voters might not be aware of this as a possibility.

Yes.

When we were in Medina, they said it's really just about educating people that this does affect, you know, as I said on the tape, 2.5% of that $24 billion that's collected goes to libraries.

That's a small part of what's collected.

But for libraries, 60%, 70%, I mean, even Cleveland Public, I think it's 55%, the main Cleveland system.

That's a big haircut to take if they're going to cut all of that out.

So obviously they're concerned and as they were discussing, there's a lot of services and just personnel that would get cut.

Are you getting the sense that people are I know you talked about some of the confusion there that people are aware of this in the communities, exactly how much of this is funding libraries?

Well, as far as axe the tax, it seems like that message maybe isn't there.

A lot of people realize about police, fire, public safety, that that's going to be impacted or would be impacted.

But public libraries, a lot of people don't realize that that's part of the equation.

They know that there's a property tax levy that they, or just a levy that they vote on for their library.

And as I said, 30 of 34 passed in the last 2 years.

Ohioans, we love our libraries.

So people probably don't realize that this thing that I love and go to all the time would be impacted if this went away.

And libraries have already seen major cuts in recent years.

Kabir, can you tell us about that?

Yeah, the public library fund got cut.

In Medina, they said 60% comes from levies.

40% had come from that.

So they had to do a lot of fancy footwork once that was taken away last year to really figure out what they were going to do as the public library fund came under fire as well.

All right, Zaria, let's talk about parks now.

You spoke to a couple of park systems, people that represent those park systems.

They said in essence that parks might have to close if funding were to go away.

Yeah, I talked to Christine Craycroft with the Portage County Park District in particular.

She's been with the district for 30 years.

They were founded in 1991, so she's kind of of seen the district go through the highs and lows of funding, uh, the district.

And they didn't pass their first and only property tax levy until 2015.

And so before that, they had to do a lot of they relied on philanthropy, donations, grants, local partnerships in order to make ends meet.

But after receiving the levy, they were able to move forward with development, acquisition, purchasing new parks, getting new parks under construction, and So they've seen a lot of growth in recent years, but prior to that it was a lot of ups and downs.

We do have some reporting from you, Zaria.

We'd like to play that now, please.

Really, it came down to the only option park districts have for funding that we control is to put on a property tax levy.

We can't issue income taxes.

We can't issue sales taxes.

Sometimes people say, well, diversify your revenues.

Maybe you could charge for services, charge for programs.

Number one, we're public servants.

We want to provide this amenity to the public.

We want to reduce the barriers for people to get out in nature and enjoy the park, so we don't want to charge entrance fees.

But beyond that, it, I mean, it would still take staff to be able to implement that program, and the amount of fees that you could get could never replace the amount that comes from the levy.

So long and short of it is we would likely have to close the parks.

It's a small investment, a great payoff, and it's for the future.

This is a legacy.

We've inherited this wonderful natural resource, this natural heritage, and it's really our responsibility to provide that legacy to the next generation.

That was Zaria talking with Portage County Executive Director Christine Craycroft there.

Thank you for sharing that reporting with us, Zaria.

If you're just joining us here on The Sound of Ideas, we are talking about property taxes.

This is on the heels of our newsroom-wide effort, Ideastream Explores Property Taxes.

You can find all of that coverage at ideastream.org.

If you want to be part of this conversation, you can call us at 866-578-0903.

You can also email us us at soi@ideastream.org or send us a message on Instagram @TheSoundOfIdeas.

Now, Zaria, you heard similar concerns with another park district that you spoke with in Medina County.

Yes, I spoke with the Medina County Park District, their executive director Nate Epping, and they he had similar takes to Christine out in Portage County.

The Medina County Park District was founded in the 1960s.

They passed their first property tax levy in 1989, but before that, similarly they went through those ups and downs as well.

They operated for 30 years without a dedicated source of funding for the property for the Park District.

So they had to rely on donations.

They had to rely on philanthropy.

They had a couple sites that were donated to the park that they were later able to build on and develop.

But after receiving the property tax levy, they were able to hire more staff, build more develop more parks, acquire more land.

So now they have 24 parks in total.

9,000 acres, more than 40 employees.

They do programming at the parks, and I was able to meet Nate out at a new park that opened last year.

And that land was donated by a family, but they had swinging benches that were funded through property taxes.

The maintenance of the park is supported through property taxes.

And so he told me that if they didn't have this source of funding, this $5 million a year to fund their operations, then that would leave them with very little options moving forward.

We have some more reporting from you, Zaria, now.

There's always somebody here, um, you know, exploring the river, just sitting and watching the, uh, the sounds of the river, the sounds of the wind in the trees.

We're able to do great things with help from nonprofits, from community members, from businesses, from landowners, but it's the property tax that keeps us going day to day.

So 68% of my property taxes go to the schools, go to my school district where my kids attend.

14% goes to the county, 14% goes to the township.

That's access to 24 parks and growing, 60 different trails, free programs, educational opportunities opportunities, and knowing that more than 9,000 acres are protected in perpetuity.

But if property taxes were to go away, we don't have enough to sustain the park district for an entire 12-month period.

That's not poor planning.

That's just how we're organized.

If you're just joining us here on The Sound of Ideas, we are talking about property taxes as the capstone to our week-long newsroom-wide project, Ideastream Explores Property Taxes.

If you want to be a part of this conversation, you can call 866-578-0903.

You can also email us at soi@ideastream.org or send us a message on Instagram @TheSoundOfIdeas.

We have an email now in from Jeff in Chagrin Falls.

Jeff writes, another important point to discuss is the importance of local organizations being transparent and thoughtful about the need and what they have the need for when they have a levy request.

It's frustrating when schools, park systems, and libraries submit, quote, trust us levies that bank on goodwill instead of demonstrating an actual need.

Jeff goes on to say, while the need may be real and important, people are hypersensitive to their budgets these days, and they need to trust that the local organization is being a good steward of their dollars.

Jeff in Chagrin Falls, thank you for sharing that with us.

Now, Kabir, as you mentioned in your reporting, you found library levies are actually very popular.

Can you elaborate on that for us a bit?

Yes.

So 30 of 34 passed over the last 2 years.

Numbers before that are pretty much in line with that.

School levies, I know, are a completely different animal.

I think you were speaking earlier about Connor, and he said that, what is it, a third of school levies pass?

Library levies pass at a much higher rate because they, unlike the schools, which maybe only impacts parents as far as voters who have kids in the schools, libraries potentially impact all age groups.

Kids who come in, seniors who come in, people who are job searching, people who just want a good book to take to the beach.

So I think that's probably the primary reason that they've ended up being more popular over the years.

And I'm talking decades as far as getting them passed and things.

The what the gentleman referred to in the email as far as trust us levies, I think people realize libraries have needed they need to buy materials.

They need to buy equipment.

You know, if people are coming in to use computers, internet, that sort of thing.

And certainly they have personnel, one-on-one services.

I mean, how many times have you gone in there said, let me just go up and ask them because the computer is not giving me the information I need.

I can't find the card catalog, something like that.

So I think that's the reason why they have proven popular.

Now, we were at the Maple Heights Library as part of this whole project, the Listen, Engage, Vote, and we talked to a number of folks, most of them of, shall we say, the grandparent age, and almost to a person, whether they lived in Maple Heights or somewhere nearby, were saying that they are concerned about property taxes as far as being able to stay in their homes.

Their homes are probably paid for at this point, and the issue of having to keep up with property taxes was a problem.

One lady who was in her 80s said she has a family member who has to help her out now with property taxes, and she's looking for work in her 80s, going back to work.

But she was there at the library.

She loves her library, and she wasn't aware that that's what's going to be happening.

So that might be the education component that I was discussing earlier with that they spoke about in Medina, getting people aware of not just the property tax connection to libraries, but the portion of their budget that would be impacted and also what they're going to be using that money for.

We did get an email now in as well from Hanson, and Hanson writes, the focus on property taxes and affordability is misplaced.

It should be on income inadequacy.

Hansen, thank you for that comment.

That might be something that might have come up for that 80-something-year-old woman who is now seeking work.

Yeah, that's I mean, it's she said she didn't want to be identified in the story because she doesn't want her name out there since she is a job seeker.

And she's so attuned to libraries.

She said, I'm coming here at this time of day because the one that's closer to my house I think she lived in Garfield the handicapped spots that are close to the door get taken early, and it's tough to get up the hill.

So I come here if it's later in the I mean, that's how much she loves her library.

But then you hear this story that she's been in her house, I think she said 14 years, and property taxes are becoming an issue.

So it is, as the email said, it's a delicate balance.

As you mentioned, Kabir, our Listen, Engage, Vote initiative, this is something where members of the Ideastream newsroom have been going around to different libraries across the Northeast Ohio region to listen to people, to figure out what it is that they would like us to be covering ahead of the midterm elections coming up in October, or in November rather, excuse me.

To me.

Zaria, what did you find when you were engaging in the Listen, Engage, Vote at the libraries?

Yeah, property taxes is definitely top of mind for a lot of the people that I spoke with out in Akron and out in Strongsville.

It's no surprise to us to hear that.

We were very prepared for those responses.

But it is a lot of, my bill, my property tax bill is too high.

But when it does come to things that people like to engage with, whether it's parks, libraries, schools, came up a lot in those conversations at the library.

They want to still support these foundations of our society, but they just can't make ends meet at home.

So it's a difficult balance.

And even Nate Epping out at the Medina County Park District said, I'm understanding, I understand, I hear you that your bills are too high, but at the same time, we need this money to do what we do.

And without these dollars, we won't be able to continue providing you the service that you've come to rely on.

I mean, people started going out to parks way more during the pandemic.

And they're still seeing a lot of those benefits.

And our local parks are still seeing a lot of these this boost in numbers from coming out of the pandemic.

So it is a balance that needs to be met.

And these county park officials have said, we don't have the answer, but we just want to make sure that you know that we need these funds as well.

And Zaria, park systems rely on property taxes not just for maintaining operations, but also developing new parks.

Can you tell us a bit about that?

Yeah.

And I wanted to go out to parks that were either funded or recently opened or in the works funded through property taxes.

So I was out at Zachary A. Weber Riverside Park in Medina County that opened last year, funded partially through property taxes and maintained through property taxes.

But in Portage County, I was at Kame Esker Bog Park.

That's a park that's still under construction.

It'll be opened within the next year or 2, I believe.

That's been the development of that site has been funded entirely through property taxes.

About 10 minutes outside of Kent, 215 acres.

It'll have the first flushing toilet at all the parks in the Portage County Park District, which seems small, but residents have been asking for it for a while.

And because of property taxes, they're finally able to deliver on it at this point.

So yeah, that's the evidence.

It's not a trust us, it's a this is what we're doing.

Okay, there we go.

Thank you for that.

I want to thank my colleagues here, Ideastream reporter Kabir Bhatia.

Thanks for being with us.

And also Zaria Johnson, thank you very much.

Thanks for having me.

And that puts a pin in our Ideastream Explores property taxes series.

You can find all of the reporting by going to our website.

Site ideastream.org.

If you missed any part of today's show, you can hear a rebroadcast tonight at 9 on 89.7 WKSU.

You can also find every episode of The Sound of Ideas wherever you get your podcasts and on the Ideastream Public Media YouTube page.

You can watch the television version of this special Thursday night at 7:30 on WVIZ PBS.

To get the last word on today's topics, you can email us at soi@ideastream.org.

You can also find us on Instagram.

We're at the 7 we're at The Sound of Ideas I'm Stephanie Haney.

Thank you for keeping the conversation going.

We'll see you back here next time on The Sound of Ideas.