Columbus Dispatch...
Worthy of debate
Proposals might improve support for school levies 

Ohio is undergoing some significant reforms — to the way public employees are compensated and economic development is courted, to name two prominent examples. In this climate of rethinking, members of the state Board of Education have thrown out some other provocative questions: What if school property taxes followed students instead of staying with local school districts? And why do property taxes have to be so complicated? 

With every election, school districts struggle to win voters’ approval of new taxes for operating expenses or new buildings. 

Meanwhile, folks in Gov. John Kasich’s Office of 21 {+s}{+t} Century Education are busy talking to school officials around the state, gathering ideas for a set of school-funding recommendations they hope to present next month and have voted into law next year. 

As charter schools become more popular, discussions of school funding often turn to the fairest way to distribute public resources to all students. Growing charter-school enrollment means that more and more children each year are schooled outside of a conventional school district, yet the school property taxes voters approve go solely to conventional public districts. 

It’s fair to ask whether that should change. 

Already, the share of school funding that comes from the state “follows the child.” When a child enrolls in a charter school, that school receives the child’s per-child state funding instead of the school district in which the child lives. 

As members of the governor’s education staff talked about funding-reform ideas with the state board recently, board members C. Todd Jones and Bryan Williams floated the idea of having at least some part of local school property taxes follow students regardless of where they go to school. For example, Jones suggested, a levy’s proceeds could be divided into two pools: one to support the school district’s basic operations and a separate pool to be distributed to every school based on how many students each has enrolled. 

Some have suggested that under this approach, school levies might have a better chance of passing because they would have more support from charter-school parents. On the other hand, some people vote for school levies not because they have children in schools, but because they believe a well-funded school district enhances their property values. 

Even if such fundamental change to the nature of school property taxes isn’t in the cards anytime soon, all Ohioans could benefit from some simplification of how property taxes are applied. 

The first barrier to understanding is the fact that tax rates are expressed in mills: a tax equal to $1 on every $1,000 of property value. 

But it doesn’t stop there; Ohio law has built many wrinkles into the formula. Residential property is taxed at only 35 percent of its assessed value. And the tax amount is reduced by a 10 percent rollback. And it’s reduced by another 2.5 percent if you’re the owner-occupant of the property. 

If you’re over 65 and meet certain criteria, you’re entitled to more reduction. 

All of these wrinkles were enacted to effect a legitimate policy goal, but over time, they’ve made property taxes hard to understand. More clarity might not make people more willing to vote themselves higher taxes, but the current lack of clarity certainly makes it easier for them to vote no. 

Read it at the Columbus Dispatch