Preserving existing rollbacks is a high priority as the Bowling Green City Schools Board of Education
discusses levy options.
The board met Saturday for 3 ½ hours to continue reviewing taxation policy. The discussion was whether to
renew levies, go with new levies or combine levies to eliminate voter fatigue.
The was the second marathon meeting with financial adviser David Conley.
The board is looking at three levy renewals in the next three years: a 4.2-mill current expenses levy
that collects $2.4 million and a $1 million emergency levy, both expiring in 2020, and a 0.50-percent
income tax levy that collects $3.4 million and expires in 2022.
The board can decide to continue as is and renew the levies every five years, keep the two levies
separate and make them continuing taxes, or combine them as continuing taxes.
Keeping the property tax rollback — which is a 12.5-percent savings for homeowners — would require the
renewal of existing levies.
That rollback is paid by the state, but once a district passes a new or replacement levy, the rollback is
gone and the taxpayer pays 100 percent.
That rollback is $7 annually for a home valued at $100,000 for the district’s $1 million emergency levy.
It is $14.88 for the 4.2-mill operating levy.
“Seems to me this is significant,” said board member Norman Geer. “We ought to take that into
consideration whether it’s a renewal or a replacement.”
The discount is preserved with continuing levies, Conley said.
In addition to renewal/replacement action, the board is also being asked to look at new operating money.
The district last successfully asked taxpayers for new money in 2010.
“They’re used to us not coming back” said board President Ginny Stewart.
“You do not last 10 years without new operating money unless someone is very careful,” said Conley, who
is with Rockmill Financial Consulting.
The levy cycle is usually three to four years, he added.
Key priorities set by the board include preserving existing funds, minimizing the amount needed for
future operations, securing funding for future operations, minimizing the number of ballot requests by
consolidating levies, minimizing and securing funding for future facilities, and changing the taxation
mix.
But Saturday’s meeting was to discuss what to do with the levies that will be expiring in the next three
years.
“Preserving the rollback would be important,” Conley said.
Superintendent Francis Scruci is concerned about voter fatigue, which comes from asking for levy renewals
every five years.
“If we’re looking at anything on renewals, maybe extend the life to continuing or 10 years to reduce
coming back over and over again,” he said.
If the district renews them for five years, “we’re going to be talking about this again in five years,”
he added. From a taxpayer standpoint, “they will like that we are preserving a discount.”
Board member Paul Walker suggested looking at areas that could be cut before asking for new money.
Cutting programs will result in losing students, Scruci said.
Uncertainty of the state budget also looms. Unfunded mandates, including College Credit Plus, drain the
budget. For CCP, the cost was $200,000 last year, Scruci said.
While it is a great program, “it’s hard to explain to taxpayers we have no control over it,” he said.
By renewing and continuing the 4.2-mill levy and the emergency levy, it preserves the rollback and
eliminates the district’s complicated tax structure, Conley said.
The district has until November 2020 to do something about the emergency and current expense levy.
The district has enjoyed an 85 percent passage rate in May and 75 percent in November, Conley said.
“Anything over 35 percent in Ohio is good,” he said.
Renewal passage is 100 percent, he added.
The board agreed that a high priority needs to be placed on using income tax as part of the funding mix
in the future.
With an income tax, the question becomes whether the board should keep a traditional tax or convert to an
earned income tax.
The 0.50-percent traditional income tax brings in $3.4 million annually. An earned income tax would need
to be 0.75 percent to bring in the same amount of money because it taxes fewer people.
Beneficiaries to an earned income tax tend to be the older residents who are not collecting wages or are
on fixed incomes, and therefore do not pay the tax.
According to the 2016 census, of the 37,373 residents in the Bowling Green school district, 10.7 percent
were age 65 and older (and showing a 13.8 percent increase) and 16.6 percent were between the ages of
45-64 (a 1.8 percent increase).
Forty-five percent were between the ages of 20-44 and showing a 0.9 percent increase.
So, 27 percent are either retired or will be in 10 years, Conley said.
Going to an earned income tax is a shifting of burden for taxpayers.
“Something’s driving the fact that older people are moving to your community,” Conley said. “Our pipeline
of taxpayers is not growing.”
The decision on whether to continue a traditional income tax or change to earned income has yet to be
decided.
Bowling Green has a lower income tax than surrounding communities. Otsego and Eastwood each have a
1-percent income tax, North Baltimore and Elmwood each have 1.25-percent taxes.
Perrysburg has 0.50-percent tax.
When you look at surrounding districts, “you are one of the lowest,” Conley said.
“We’ve got to figure out what the community can bear,” Stewart said.
“Taxation policy has a direct impact on how a community develops,” Conley said. “School facilities
matter.”
When people see new buildings in other communities, they ask why would they want to put their children in
an old building, he said.
The second thing people look at is how much is the income tax and the property tax.
Conley has built a model where task force members can type in the cost of a facility plan and get the
subsequent income tax and property tax amounts.
“We don’t how much the project would be and how much people would want to do with an income tax,” he
said.
The board will meet again Saturday at 9 a.m. at the Central Administration Building. At the meeting, more
information on facilities will be known.
The financial task for meets Thursday and the facilities tax force meets Wednesday.
“We need to work on our levies,” Walker said after the meeting. To avoid voter fatigue, he said that he
favors switching the levies to continuing and worrying about new money later.
Stewart said the board always learns something new at these meetings, but what stands out is “we have a
lot of options.”
She has not decided yet on a preference on continuing the levies.
“I don’t want to make any decisions until we’re completely done with this process, because there may be
more information that comes out,” Stewart said.