Residents such as Shawn Wright, a mother of five in Butler County’s Lemon Twp., whose tax bill went up $824 from two years ago despite no changes to her property or new tax issues passing, are feeling the pain. That pain is only going to get worse until action is taken by state lawmakers. Butler County Auditor Nancy Nix warns very early predictions are values could increase 13% to 25%, as of January 2026 to be paid the following year.
Credit: CONTRIBUTED
Credit: CONTRIBUTED
What’s causing these dramatic increases? Our reporting points to a number of complex, connected factors, and many solutions have been proposed – and shot down – at the Statehouse. In the interest of delivering on promises of meaningful reform to give relief to taxpayers, this editorial board suggests that lawmakers set their sights on provisions that are causing tax increases regardless of how communities vote on their levies, the most notable of which is known as the “20-mill floor.”
“We have been screaming from mountaintops, that’s what needs capped,” Clark County Auditor Hillary Hamilton recently told this news outlet when asked about the 20-mill floor.
What is the 20-mill floor?
While property taxes are linked to property values, Ohio lawmakers decades ago tried putting measures in place to prevent a red-hot housing market like we are seeing now from causing crippling property tax increases. This law lowers the tax rate for most voted levies so they collect the same amount of money as values rise.
But for schools, there is a limit to how low it can go. This is the 20-mill floor. If a school district’s total millage — or tax rate — hits that floor, any growth in property values will create a corresponding increase in taxes.
Ironically, this means that school districts where residents have passed fewer levies have the potential to see the largest automatic tax increases.
After the 2023 appraisal, the average countywide residential tax increase in Montgomery County was 5.8%. But in school districts at or below the 20-mill floor the average hikes ranged from 8% to 16%. Farmersville and New Lebanon had the largest average tax increases without voter approval at 13.8% each.
Community choice matters
We are not arguing for or against school funding or any other services paid for by a community’s property taxes. We are also not in favor of extreme measures, such as the elimination of property taxes altogether. We are, however, in favor of local control and targeted reform that allows voters to better decide for themselves how they choose to fund their schools and services.
Tax increases based on home valuation or other automatic mechanisms, such as inside millage, that distort the outcome of democratically voted-upon levies subvert the will of a community and could endanger future levy support.
Voters need to know what they’re voting for. If property tax calculations are not made more transparent and predictable, it’s not unreasonable for voters, rightfully skeptical, to start to vote against more levies in the future.
Gov. DeWine has convened a second group to study the property tax issue. The first group was a bipartisan legislative commission that released a list of recommendations but enacted no reform. We hope this second group is able to produce meaningful recommendations by its Sept. 30 deadline.
We support the group’s endorsement of House Bill 186, a measure that would limit increases in property tax revenues for school districts at the 20-mill floor to the three-year average rate of inflation.
Warren County Auditor Matt Nolan, president of the County Auditors Association of Ohio and a reform committee member, said this was CAAO’s idea, “the capping of growth on the 20-mill floor is the best way to stop these dramatic increases in taxes without a vote.”
Our taxes pay for important services. And as all of our communities have different needs, each community has the right to choose how it decides to fund the services required to meet those needs.
Ohio property owners are demanding action. We ask our state leaders of both parties to work swiftly toward property tax reform.
Credit: Alexis Larsen
Credit: Alexis Larsen
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