By Andrew Tobias for Signal Cleveland.
Broadcast version by Brett Peveto for Ohio News Connection reporting for the Signal Ohio-Public News Service Collaboration
Ohio’s property tax system is supposed to protect homeowners. It’s designed to prevent big increases in their home’s value from translating to big increases in their tax bills.
This is done by the “reduction factor” in the state’s current tax formula, which in most cases automatically reduces tax rates when property values go up in a given community. This reduction factor, or safety valve of sorts, is the heart of House Bill 920, a 1976 reform that established Ohio’s modern system of property taxation. Lawmakers passed it in response to an historic rise in home prices.
But today the formula is showing signs of breaking down. As a result, homeowners in a record number of school districts – mostly concentrated in rural and exurban areas – won’t get the full benefit of that safety valve on the taxes they pay to local schools.
That means homeowners in these communities – which have a lower tax base experts call the “20-mill floor” – are seeing bigger hikes in their tax bill compared to homeowners in some other parts of the state.
Last year, property values jumped by an average of 35% in counties that updated their values. For homeowners in communities where the safety valve was shut off, this would translate to a roughly 25% larger tax bill. For areas where it stayed on, the increase likely would be more like 5%.
Several state lawmakers describe rising property taxes as the single top issue for their constituents, especially for seniors and others on fixed incomes. So they have introduced various bipartisan bills meant to lessen the financial damage on homeowners. But none of the bills has gotten final approval, and it’s unclear whether any will before the legislature breaks at the end of the year.
“We’re going through something that’s pretty unusual, and it’s having this extreme effect,” said Howard Fleeter, a Columbus-based economist who studies and advises school districts on school-funding issues.
Why the safety valve doesn’t help all communities
Ohio assesses property taxes in units called “mills,” each one of which translates to $35 in taxes per $100,000 in property value. Local governments are allowed to charge property owners up to 10 mills, or $350 per $100,000 in value, in taxes without taking any special steps.
But voters must approve any property taxes beyond that. This is why school districts and other local governments commonly put tax levies on the ballot.
Setting up taxes this way could mean approved property taxes would rise indefinitely without another vote as home values rise. That’s why the state’s complex tax formula has a safety valve to protect homeowners. It automatically lowers tax rates for most voter-approved levies via the reduction factor when property values go up while guaranteeing the tax raises the same amount of money it did when voters first approved it.
The combination generally keeps a homeowner’s tax bill stable even if their property value goes up.
But if the tax rate drops to 20 mills, the state formula shuts off the reduction factor and locks in the rate. The technical name is “20-mill floor,” and it’s meant to make sure school districts get enough funding to operate.
In communities at or below the 20-mill floor, homeowners get no protection from the reduction factor on the portion of their tax bill that goes to schools – which is around two-thirds of most homeowners’ tax bills. So their tax bill would go up significantly if their property sees a significant increase in value.
Who is most likely to see the larger hikes on their property tax bills?
As of January 2024, 409 of Ohio’s 611 school districts were at the 20-mill floor, according to Fleeter, the Columbus economist who studies school funding.
That’s double the number from five years ago, and it’s likely to continue going up.
Fleeter said there’s one major reason for the increase: The ongoing process in which county auditors are updating property tax values for the first time since the coronavirus pandemic sent home prices soaring. Ohio updates its tax values at the county level, with one-third of counties doing so each year.
Updates done in 2023 are showing up on tax bills this year. Fleeter expects similarly large property value increases for the 2024 revaluation, which will include Cuyahoga, Lake, Lorain and Stark counties and will take effect in 2025.
Fleeter said counties that updated property values in 2023 saw an average increase of nearly 35%. The reduction factor kicked in and lowered property tax rates in many communities, sending their rates to the 20-mill floor. But by hitting the floor, the safety valve shut off.
“There’s a problem in these districts where taxpayers are seeing large tax increases that House Bill 920 was supposed to prevent,” Fleeter said.
In high-tax communities, the floor is never hit
In areas where voters have approved high property taxes, like Cuyahoga County, tax rates are high enough that they’re unlikely to ever approach the 20-mill floor.
But it’s more likely to be an issue for communities where voters have approved fewer property taxes in general. These are usually found in rural and exurban areas.
There are some exceptions.
For example, the Cincinnati City School District, the state’s second-largest public school system, is at the 20-mill floor, according to state tax data. This is because the district gets a significant portion of its funding from an emergency levy. State law exempts emergency levies from counting against the 20-mill floor, which means the increased property values have a larger tax effect for homeowners there.
Other school districts with large emergency levies at the 20-mill floor include Willoughby-Eastlake combined schools in Lake County, Perrysville village schools in Wood County and Mansfield City Schools in Richland County.
In the other 202 school districts with the 20-mill floor, the reduction factor should still help prevent huge tax increases. These generally are in suburban and urban areas that pay higher taxes to begin with.
The particulars will vary by property owner, since the state’s property tax formula also factors in how someone’s property value changed compared to the average change in their community.
“This is a real question in many rural districts in a way it’s not in the same way in urban districts,” said Zach Schiller, a researcher with Policy Matters Ohio, a liberal think tank. “… It does still mean we have significant numbers of people who are in fact seeing a squeeze because their property taxes are going up. And that’s a problem that needs to be addressed.
Andrew Tobias wrote this article for Signal Cleveland. This story was produced in association with Media in the Public Interest and funded in part by the George Gund Foundation.
get more stories like this via email
By Kari Lydersen for Canary Media.
Broadcast version by Terri Dee for Illinois News Connection reporting for the Canary Media-Resource Rural-Public News Service Collaboration
A fistfight at a high school football game nearly defined Shawn Honorable's life.
It was 1999 when he and a group of teen boys were expelled and faced criminal charges over the incident. The story of the "Decatur Seven" drew national headlines and protests led by the Rev. Jesse Jackson, who framed their harsh treatment as blatant racism. The governor eventually intervened, and the students were allowed to attend alternative schools.
Honorable, now 41, was encouraged by support "from around the world," but he said the incident was traumatizing and he continued to struggle academically and socially. Over the years, he dabbled in illegal activity and was incarcerated, most recently after a 2017 conviction for accepting a large amount of marijuana sent through the mail.
Today, Honorable is ready to start a new chapter, having graduated with honors last week from a clean energy workforce training program at Richland Community College, located in the Central Illinois city of Decatur. He would eventually like to own or manage a solar company, but he has more immediate plans to start a solar-powered mobile hot dog stand. He's already chosen the name: Buns on the Run.
"By me going back to school and doing this, it shows my nephews and my little cousins and nieces that it is good to have education," Honorable said. "I know this is going to be the new way of life with solar panels. So I'll have a step up on everyone. When it comes, I will already be aware of what's going on with this clean energy thing."
After decades of layoffs and factory closings, the community of Decatur is also looking to clean energy as a potential springboard.
Located amid soybean fields a three-hour drive from Chicago, the city was long known for its Caterpillar, Firestone Tire, and massive corn-syrup factories. Industrial jobs have been in decline for decades, though, and high rates of gun violence, child poverty, unemployment, and incarceration were among the reasons the city was named a clean energy workforce hub funded under Illinois' 2021 Climate and Equitable Jobs Act (CEJA).
Decatur's hub, based at Richland Community College, is arguably the most developed and successful of the dozen or so established statewide. That's thanks in part to TCCI Manufacturing, a local, family-owned factory that makes electric vehicle compressors. TCCI is expanding its operations with a state-of-the-art testing facility and an on-site campus where Richland students will take classes adjacent to the manufacturing floor. The electric truck company Rivian also has a factory 50 miles away.
"The pieces are all coming together," Kara Demirjian, senior vice president of TCCI Manufacturing, said by email. "What makes this region unique is that it's not just about one company or one product line. It's about building an entire clean energy ecosystem. The future of EV manufacturing leadership won't just be on the coasts - it's being built right here in the Midwest."
The Decatur CEJA program has also flourished because it was grafted onto a preexisting initiative, EnRich, that helps formerly incarcerated or otherwise disenfranchised people gain new skills and employment. The program is overseen by the Rev. Courtney Carson, a childhood friend of Honorable and another member of the Decatur Seven.
"So many of us suffer significantly from our unmet needs, our unhealed traumas," said Carson, who was jailed as a young man for gun possession and later drag racing. With the help of mentors including Rev. Jackson and a college basketball coach, he parlayed his past into leadership, becoming associate pastor at a renowned church, leading a highway construction class at Richland, and in 2017 being elected to the same school board that had expelled him.
Carson, now vice president of external relations at the community college, tapped his own experience to shape EnRich as a trauma-informed approach, with wraparound services to help students overcome barriers - from lack of childcare to PTSD to a criminal record. Carson has faith that students can overcome such challenges to build more promising futures, like Decatur itself has done.
"We have all these new opportunities coming in, and there's a lot of excitement in the city," Carson said. "That's magnificent. So what has to happen is these individuals who suffered from closures, they have to be reminded that there is hope."
Getting students ready for the clean energy workforce
Richland Community College's clean energy jobs training starts with an eight-week life skills course that has long been central to the larger EnRich program. The course uses a Circle of Courage practice inspired by Indigenous communities and helps students prepare to handle stressful workplace situations like being disrespected or even called a racial slur.
"Being called the N-word, couldn't that make you want to fight somebody? But now you lose your job," said Carson. "We really dive deep into what's motivating their attitude and those traumas that have significantly impacted their body to make them respond to situations either the right way or the wrong way."
The training addresses other dynamics that might be unfamiliar to some students - for example, some male students might not be prepared to be supervised by a woman, Carson noted, or others might not be comfortable with LGBTQ+ coworkers.
Life skills are followed by a construction math course crucial to many clean energy and other trades jobs. During a recent class, 24-year-old Brylan Hodges joked with the teacher while converting fractions to decimals and percentages on the whiteboard. He explained that he moved from St. Louis to Decatur in search of opportunity, and he hopes to become a property manager overseeing solar panel installation and energy-efficiency upgrades on buildings.
Students take an eight-hour primer in clean energy fields including electric vehicles, solar, HVAC, and home energy auditing. Then they choose a clean energy track to pursue, leading to professional certifications as well as a chance to continue at Richland for an associate degree. Under the state-funded program, students are paid for their time attending classes.
Marcus James was part of the first cohort to start the program last October, just days after his release from prison.
He was an 18-year-old living in Memphis, Tennessee, when someone shot at him, as he describes it, and he fired back, with fatal consequences. He was convicted of murder and spent 12 years behind bars. After his release he made his way to Decatur, looking for a safer place to raise his kids. Adjusting to life on the outside wasn't easy, and he ended up back in prison for a year and a half on DUI and drug possession charges.
Following his release, he was determined to turn his life around.
"After I brought my kids up here, I end up going back to prison. But at that moment, I realized, man, I had to change," James told a crowd at an event celebrating the clean jobs program in March.
James said that at first, he showed up late to every class. But soon the lessons sank in, and he was never late again. He always paid attention when people talked, and he gained new confidence.
"As long as I put my mind to it, I can do it," said James, who would like to work as a home energy auditor. Richland partners with the energy utility Ameren to place trainees in such positions.
"I like being out in the field, learning new stuff, dealing with homes, helping people," James said, noting he made energy-efficiency improvements to his own home after the course.
How Illinois' energy policy prioritizes equity
Illinois' 2017 Future Energy Jobs Act (FEJA) launched the state's clean energy transition, baking in equity goals that prioritize opportunities for people who benefited least and were harmed most by the fossil fuel economy. It created programs to deploy solar arrays and provide job training in marginalized and environmental justice communities.
FEJA's rollout was rocky. Funding for equity-focused solar installations went unspent while workforce programs struggled to recruit trainees and connect them with jobs. The pandemic didn't help. The follow-up legislation, CEJA, expanded workforce training programs and remedied snafus in the original law.
Melissa Gombar is principal director of workforce development programs for Elevate, a Chicago-based national nonprofit organization that oversaw FEJA job training and subcontracts for a Chicago-area CEJA hub. Gombar said many community organizations tasked with running FEJA training programs were relatively small and grassroots, so they had to scramble to build new financial and human resources infrastructure.
"They have to have certain policies in place for hiring and procurement. The influx of grant money might have doubled their budget," Gombar said. Meanwhile, the state employees tasked with helping the groups "are really talented and skilled, trying their best, but they're overburdened because of the large lift."
CEJA, by contrast, tapped community colleges like Richland, which already had robust infrastructure and staffing. CEJA also funds community organizations to serve as "navigators," using the trust and credibility they've developed in communities to recruit trainees.
Richland Community College received $2.6 million from April 2024 through June 2025, and the Community Foundation of Macon County, the hub's navigator, received $440,000 for the same time period. The other hubs similarly received between $1 million and $3.3 million for the past year, and state officials have said the same level of funding will be allocated for each of the next two years, according to the Illinois Clean Jobs Coalition.
CEJA hubs also include social service providers that connect trainees with wraparound support; businesses like TCCI that offer jobs; and affiliated entrepreneur incubators that help people start their own clean energy businesses. CEJA also funded apprenticeship and pre-apprenticeship programs with labor unions, which are often a prerequisite for employment in utility-scale solar and wind.
"The sum of the parts is greater than the whole," said Drew Keiser, TCCI vice president of global human resources. "The navigator is saying, 'Hey, I've connected with this portion of the population that's been overlooked or underserved.' OK, once you get them trained, send their resumes to me, and I'll get them interviewed. We're seeing a real pipeline into careers."
The hub partners go to great lengths to aid students - for example, coordinating and often paying for transportation, childcare, or even car repairs.
"If you need some help, they always there for you," James said.
What's next for Decatur and its clean energy trainees?
In 1984, TCCI began making vehicle compressors in a Decatur plant formerly used to build Sherman tanks during World War II. A few decades later, the company began producing compressors for electric vehicles, which are much more elaborate and sensitive than those for internal combustion engines.
In August 2023, Gov. JB Pritzker joined TCCI President Richard Demirjian, the Decatur mayor, and college officials for the groundbreaking of an Electric Vehicle Innovation Hub, which will include a climatic research facility - basically a high-tech wind tunnel where companies and researchers from across the world can send EV chargers, batteries, compressors, and other components for testing in extreme temperatures, rain, and wind.
A $21.3 million capital grant and a $2.2 million electric vehicle incentive from the state are funding the wind tunnel and the new facilities where Richland classes will be held. In 2022, Pritzker announced these investments as furthering the state goal of 1 million EVs on the road by 2030.
Far from the gritty industrial environs that likely characterized Decatur workplaces of the past, the classrooms at TCCI feature colorful decor, comfortable armchairs, and bright, airy spaces adjacent to pristine high-tech manufacturing floors lined with machines.
"This hub is a game changer," said Keiser, noting the need for trained tradespeople. "As a country, we place a lot of emphasis on kids going to college, and maybe we've kind of overlooked getting tangible skills in the hands of folks."
A marketing firm founded by Kara Demirjian - Richard Demirjian's sister - and located on-site with TCCI also received clean energy hub funds to promote the training program. This has been crucial to the hub's success, according to Ariana Bennick, account executive at the firm, DCC Marketing. Its team has developed, tested, and deployed digital billboards, mailers, ads, Facebook events, and other approaches to attract trainees and business partners.
"Being a part of something here in Decatur that's really leading the nation in this clean energy initiative is exciting," Bennick said. "It can be done here in the middle of the cornfields. We want to show people a framework that they can take and scale in other places."
With graduation behind him, Honorable is planning the types of hot dogs and sausages he'll sell at Buns on the Run. He said Tamika Thomas, director of the CEJA program at Richland, has also encouraged him to consider teaching so he can share the clean energy skills he's learned with others. The world seems wide open with possibilities.
"A little at a time - I'm going to focus on the tasks in front of me that I'm passionate about, and then see what's next," Honorable said. He invoked a favorite scene from the cartoon TV series "The Flintstones," in which the characters' leg power, rather than wheels and batteries, propelled vehicles: "Like Fred and Barney, I'll be up and running."
Kari Lydersen wrote this article for Canary Media and Resource Rural.
get more stories like this via email
Contact
