An Ohio lawmaker is proposing a dramatic change to the state’s tax structure by eliminating local property taxes and replacing them with a statewide tax.
Statehouse News reports Sen. Andrew Brenner, the Republican chairman of the Ohio Senate Education Committee, declared his proposal would alleviate the complaints made by homeowners on rising property taxes while ensuring schools receive proper funding. Under Brenner’s Senate Bill 93, local school property taxes would be replaced by a single statewide 20-mill property tax and a 1.75% sales tax increase, bringing the total state sales tax to 7.5%. Brenner’s bill also includes education reforms including the elimination of the EdChoice voucher program, allowing K-12 students to use school choice, and mandating that school districts allow open enrollment.
“It shifts the money to follow the student to the school of their choice,” Brenner said. “So if you have kids who have disabilities, you have kids who are gifted, etc. or even transportation, those dollars would follow based on the students in those categoricals back to the local district or jurisdiction where they’re going.”
Brenner added the sales tax increase component will apply to “people not only in Ohio, but anybody who comes into Ohio to pay our sales tax. So, I think that’s a way to help subsidize our schools and try to lift some of that burden off of our local taxpayers.”
Furthermore, Brenner noted there is a companion piece to his legislation, Senate Joint Resolution 4, which enables the state to assume all school debt.
“This alternative might be a better alternative because people would say, ‘you know what, instead of getting rid of all of the property taxes, we’ll go with this plan instead’,” Brenner said. “I think that we need to have an open discussion of how do we fund our schools and is this the best way and is there a better way of doing it.”
