An analysis of a Republican-backed bill that seeks to help struggling homeowners by lowering the amount of property tax they pay shows it could be a devastating hit to Ohio’s public schools.
House Bill 335 is one of more than two dozen bills on property taxes and levies that have been introduced in the legislature this year. It has several components, but a major one would eliminate inside millage—the 1% of property tax value that can be levied by local entities without voter approval. Backers of the bill say it would save property taxpayers $3.5 billion
A preliminary analysis from the Legislative Service Commission shows public schools would lose just under $2 billion. That LSC analysis was included in a report from the Ohio Education Policy Institute, which looks into the budget and state policy for the state's major school groups. For that report, school funding expert Howard Fleeter said to put that loss in perspective, he looked at the average salary and benefit packages for each district to estimate how many teachers could lose their jobs.
"The answer to this was sobering. It was a much larger number than I would have thought," Fleeter said. “Almost 20,000 teachers would need to be let go if $2 billion in property taxes were to evaporate at the beginning of next year. The number of full-time teachers in Ohio in fiscal year '24 was almost exactly 101,000. So 20,000 teachers is 19.7% of the workforce.”
Fleeter described the results as "cataclysmic for school districts".
"I don't think it's much of an exaggeration," Fleeter said. "I don't see how school districts could possibly cut costs for that magnitude of revenue loss and not impact the teaching of students and the delivery of the services that they need to provide. And the same thing is true for the other local governments."
The bill is sponsored by Rep. David Thomas (R-Jefferson). In an interview for "The State of Ohio", Thomas said he wants his bill to pass before January’s property tax bills hit. And he's also hoping to address concerns raised by a group that's gathering signatures for a constitutional amendment to abolish all property taxes in Ohio, but not to stop the issue.
"I know the folks that are pushing the constitutional amendment pretty well. I totally sympathize. They've seen the legislature over the last five years taking small steps or doing small things, but not not really addressing their overall frustration and concern. And they're seeing this problem only escalating and getting much, much worse," Thomas said. "The bill isn't meant to try and stop anything or prevent anything. The bill is essentially responding to the folks who have said, 'you've done nothing for five years.'"
Thomas also said schools and local governments could make up the lost inside millage with income or sales tax levies. But district officials note 70% of new school levies fail, and money from a levy in November wouldn’t come in until mid-2026.
"I'm not really too concerned about that timing period, because counties will get through. What I'm really concerned about is the property owners and what their bills are going to look like," Thomas said. "For a third of the state, that's increasing again by 30% in January of 2026. If we don't do something bold like this, we're going to have a third of Ohioans seeing their property taxes spike again after we've been through five years of this. And that's certainly not sustainable."
The LSC analysis shows along with $2 billon in inside millage that school districts would lose, county governments would lose $853 million and municipalities would lose $654 million – money they use for law enforcement, infrastructure and public services.
