COLUMBUS, Ohio — The candidates for Ohio governor have unveiled more in-depth policies to reduce the growing property tax crisis. A nonpartisan tax expert isn't too impressed.
Although he initially campaigned to eliminate all property taxes, Ohio Republican nominee for governor Vivek Ramaswamy says that’s no longer feasible.
"In an ideal world, I don't want to pay any of these taxes, OK?" Ramaswamy said at a town hall event in Strongsville last Friday.
"I can deliver that property tax cut without hurting local police, fire, or schools because that's what they were working with just a few years ago in the pre-pandemic era," he said.
He now wants to roll back property taxes to 2020 levels and then cap their growth.
"I think that's a lousy idea, in part, because you're providing aid to a lot of people who don't need it," nonpartisan tax expert Zach Schiller with Policy Matters Ohio said. "Let's target our property tax relief at people who can't afford it."
Schiller talked to us about ideas raised by both gubernatorial teams and how realistic they are. He is not endorsing, but speaking about the policy ideas separately from the candidate.
He said returning to 2020 levels would only work if the state pays for all the lost revenue to local governments.
Previously, I have asked Ramaswamy how he plans to pay for this, but he hasn’t answered. But at the town hall, he floated an idea.
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"Simplify the bureaucracy, downsize the bureaucracy," Ramaswamy said.
Attempting to get rid of "waste" isn't entirely new to the candidate. Prior to announcing his run for governor, he was supposed to lead the federal Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). He didn't end up doing so.
"It's an easy thing to say that doesn't really get at the issue in a significant way," Schiller said, noting that getting rid of 'bureaucracy' would be just a drop in the bucket to making up the money.
Meanwhile, Democratic candidates Amy Acton and her running mate, David Pepper, just unveiled a policy plan, including a rebate for recent tax increases and expanding the homestead exemption.
"You save thousands and thousands of seniors real dollars in what they're paying in property taxes," Pepper said.
The rebate proposal would impact homeowners with household incomes below $132,000 who pay property taxes on homes valued at or below $350,000. They would be eligible for a rebate of up to $1,000 when their property tax bill has increased more than 4% over the prior year.
The campaign is also trying to "crack down on predatory collection practices," including the sale of tax lien certificates to private collectors who charge 18% interest rates.
The homestead exemption proposal would raise the cap on the household income eligibility of Ohio’s seniors to $50,000.
"It's a sensible idea," Schiller said. "I think that it's nowhere near enough."
The Democrats are also proposing an increase in funding for public schools so districts won’t need to rely as heavily on property taxes.
"How are you going to pay for some of these tax relief plans?" I asked Pepper.
"It's a large budget; it's about priorities," Pepper responded. "My attitude is: they have found the money to give big gifts and breaks to the people at the top; We can find money and budgets to help everybody else."
In the last budget, the Republicans passed a flat income tax for the state's top earners. They also provided $600 million in unclaimed funds to the Cleveland Browns for their new Brook Park stadium.
Acton and Pepper said they would not increase any existing taxes, though.
Schiller questioned how much of their plans would be accomplished given the lack of action from the general assembly for years.
"Will there be any chance that it can actually go anywhere? I would hope that there would be, but based on history, we haven't seen a lot of that," he said.
Libertarian candidate Don Kissick, according to his campaign website, is fully supportive of repealing property taxes.
"We prefer to see local consumption-based taxes and because there is no transparency around where the lottery is going (since it's a general education fund), we're thinking it is being used as a stopgap for other areas of the budget. In that, if we balance the budget and eliminate corporate welfare for the larger institutions, we can save a ton of money for Ohioans," the campaign website said.
Schiller said that was absolutely the worst idea he had heard, and would be "catastrophic" for the state. The most likely to be successful, in his view, was the homestead exemption. He would favor a circuit breaker, though.
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