Ohio Municipal League
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Columbus, Ohio 43215

614-221-4349 Office
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email:
Legislative Inquiries
John Mahoney
General Inquiries
info@omunileague.org

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Annexation, Natural Gas Bills To Be Heard.

The General Assembly will return this coming week for what is likely to be the last week of session for the year. The schedule this week is light on bills of municipal interest, though there are a couple of items which will have hearings.

The first is that SB 289, the annexation bill, will be up for a hearing and possible vote on Tuesday, December 5 at 9:45 a.m. in the House Local Government and Townships Committee. That hearing will be held in House Hearing Room 018. This is listed as a hearing for Proponent and Opponent testimony and will likely be the last opportunity to voice your concerns about this bill through testimony. SB 289 still contains most of the problems that concerned the League when the bill left the Senate.

The League has been working with the Speaker of the House and others to try to clear up some of the practical problems which still exist in the bill. We will probably know this week if any of those efforts can be successful.

Also on Tuesday, there will a hearing on SB 287 in the House Ways and Means Committee at 2:00 p.m. in House Hearing Room 122. That bill will put natural gas utility companies on the same tax footing as the investor-owned electric utility companies will enjoy under state deregulation. The bill contains provisions, supported by the League, that will make up through state revenues lost tax revenues to local government resulting from this news tax structure.

The bill is expected to also contain a couple of clarifying amendments to HB 477, which was legislation passed earlier making changes to the municipal income tax law. The League is working closely with the sponsor of those amendments to make sure they are acceptable.