|
|
|
Ohio Municipal League email:
Also please include a phone number and/or address for instances when we need
further contact with you. Please type
“OML Inquiry” in subject line so that we can identify e-mails picked up as spam. |
No. 02 February 11, 2005 PLEASE CIRCULATE THIS BULLETIN TO YOUR COUNCIL, DEPARTMENT HEADS & STAFF Administration Unveils Budget; LGF cuts up to 20%. This week, the Taft administration unveiled its tax and spending plan for the new biennium, which begins July 1 of this year. For local governments, the administration offered its advice about creative budgeting and cuts, from the statutory formula, in all local government funds totaling almost $700 million over the biennium. The advice came from the Governor’s chief of staff. In the Columbus Dispatch, he is quoted as saying “ I suspect some representatives of local governments will immediately claim that we are responsible for future fire and police layoffs. I would challenge those folks to be a little more responsible and creative in their budgeting.” We’re not sure when or how it was determined by the Taft administration that municipal officials throughout Ohio have been irresponsible and lacking creativity in their work to steer municipal budgets through a tough four years in which Ohio ranked 49th in job growth, but there you have it; your helpful budget advice for the week. If you have to lay off police and fire due to cuts in state funding, it’s your fault, not the state’s. The local government fund cuts proposed by the Taft administration work off the freezes in local government funds as their base. The freeze would remain in effect until January, 2006. The freeze level of funding would then be cut by 20% for cities and counties, 10% for villages and townships and 5% for libraries through the end of the biennium (June 30, 2007). The freeze would go into temporary law, which means the statutory formula for the local government funds, which has not been used in four years, would remain in law. For the Local Government Fund and the Local Government Revenue Assistance Fund, the state would determine the undivided local government fund that goes to each county, reduce the amount of that fund attributable to villages and townships, by 10%. Everything else would be reduced by 20% and that total amount would be sent to each county to be distributed based on the formula used by each county. There are few, if any, other significant line-items in the budget which suffer anything like the 20% cut to cities and counties. Also included in the budget is a $2.75 a ton state tipping fee to fund the removal of the Ohio EPA from the state’s General Revenue Fund Budget. For municipalities with free public waste collection, that increased fee will amount to another multi-million contribution to balancing the state GRF budget through municipal general funds. The budget does not include any municipal income tax changes. It does include some changes to the Ohio Estate Tax, but it was not clear, due to mixed signals from the administration, what those changes mean for revenues from the estate tax to local governments. We will get the correct information to you on this issue as soon as possible. In the budget, the administration offered a variety of tax changes, including a five-year phase in of an across-the- board reduction in state income tax rates. The administration is also proposing an elimination of the tangible personal property tax. Losses to local governments caused by that elimination would be reimbursed on a gradually declining schedule for a period of fifteen years. The administration proposes keeping one-half of the temporary sales tax in effect, raising by 10% the property taxes on all commercial properties in Ohio by eliminating the state property tax rollback, raising the Kilowatt-hour tax by 30%. The proposal also calls for the phasing-out of the state’s corporate franchise tax, in favor of a corporate activity tax. The budget also calls for raising taxes on beer, wine, cigarettes and other tobacco products. Obviously, if the administration is successful in making the changes they want to Ohio’s tax structure, the current, but unused local government formulas, would have to be significantly altered to be useful, should the state in the future wish to return to the use of that formula. LEGISLATIVE COMMITTEES FOR THE WEEK OF FEBRUARY 14, 2005 MONDAY, FEBRUARY 14 House Finance & Appropriations, (Chr. Calvert, 466-8140), Rm. 313, 1 p.m. Operating budget presentations from Lt. Governor Bruce Johnson, OBM Director Tom Johnson, Tax Commissioner Bill Wilkins and LSC's Steve Mansfield TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 15 House Finance & Appropriations, (Chr. Calvert, 466-8140), Rm. 313, 9 a.m. Presentation on the transportation budget by ODOT Director Gordon Proctor; the workers' compensation budget by BWC Administrator Jim Conrad and the Industrial Commission budget by IC Chairman Bill Thompson. Senate Finance & Financial Institutions, (Chr. Carey, 466-8156), Finance Hearing Rm., 2:30 p.m. SJR 2 CAPITAL IMPROVEMENT BONDS (Carey) Proposing to enact Sec. 2p of Art. VIII of the Constitution of the State of Ohio to permit the issuance of general obligation bonds to fund local government public infrastructure capital improvements. (2nd Hearing-Proponent, opponent & interested party - Possible vote) House Finance & Appropriations: Transportation & Justice Sub., (Chr. Patton. T., 466-4895), W. Harrison Rm. (formerly 113), 7 p.m. (1st Hearing on transportation budget) WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 16 Senate Judiciary-Criminal Justice, (Chr. Jordan, 466-7584), North Hearing Rm., 9 a.m. SB 9 OHIO TERRORISM LAW (Jacobson) To require law enforcement officers to comply with certain federal mandates regarding homeland security; to create the offenses of criminal possession of a chemical weapon or biological weapon, criminal use of a chemical weapon or biological weapon, illegal assembly or possession of chemicals for the manufacture of a chemical weapon or biological weapon, money laundering in support of terrorism, and unlawful possession of a powerful laser; to require applicants for certain specified licenses to disclose any material assistance they have provided to an organization on the United States Department of State Terrorist Exclusion List; to prohibit the state or a political subdivision of the state from conducting business with any person, company, or others that provide material assistance to any organization on the United States Department of State Terrorist Exclusion List; to require a person in a public place to provide the person's name to a law enforcement officer when the law enforcement officer has reasonable suspicion that either the person is or has been engaged in criminal activity or the person has witnessed a felony offense of violence; to expand the homeland security duties of the Department of Public Safety; and to include animal and ecological terrorism in the definition of corrupt activity. (3rd Hearing-Proponent, opponent & interested party) Senate Ways & Means & Economic Development, (Chr. Amstutz, 466-7505), Finance Hearing Rm., 9 a.m. SB 1 TAX LAWS (Amstutz) To formally state the General Assembly's intentions in its upcoming deliberations on reforming Ohio's tax laws. (1st Hearing-Presentation from Taft Administration officials) House Civil & Commercial Law, (Chr. Seitz, 466-8258), Hayes Rm. (formerly 114), 9:30 a.m. HB 9 PUBLIC RECORDS LAW (Oelslager) To revise the Public Records Law. (2nd Hearing-Proponent) House Finance & Appropriations: Transportation & Justice Sub., (Chr. Patton. T., 466-4895), W. Harrison Rm. (formerly 113), 3 p.m. (2nd Hearing on transportation budget) THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 17 House Finance & Appropriations, (Chr. Calvert, 466-8140), Rm. 313, 9 a.m. Possible votes (pending referral) on the budgets of the Department of Transportation; Bureau of Workers' Compensation & Industrial Commission. House Local & Municipal Government & Urban Revitalization, (Chr. Wolpert, 466-9690), Rm. 018, 11 a.m. HJR 3 CAPITAL IMPROVEMENT BONDS (Law) Proposing to enact Sec. 2p of Art. VIII of the Constitution of the State of Ohio to permit the issuance of general obligation bonds to fund local government public infrastructure capital improvements. (2nd Hearing-Proponent) HB 41 NONRESIDENT TAXPAYERS (Schaffer) To require municipal corporations with more than $100 million in annual income tax collections to provide a tax credit to nonresident taxpayers. (1st Hearing-Sponsor) |
