CINCINNATI — The Cincinnati Property Tax Task Force has issued its findings and recommendations following five months of public input.
In December, Hamilton County sent out new appraisal and levy information for homeowners. According to aJune report by Housing Opportunities Made Equal in collaboration with eruka, 50% of property tax bills either decreased or remained relatively stable. But, 45% of bills saw significant increases and 5% of bills more than doubled.
The task force found five major themes after public comment and dialogue:
- Property tax increases are threatening owners’ abilities to stay in their home, maintain their home, and build generational wealth, particularly older Cincinnatians on fixed income and in communities of color.
- There is a lack of transparency in the way that property taxes are assessed.
- Property tax increases were quick and unexpected – in some cases, there was only 20 days’ notice.
- Homestead Exemptions have not been as helpful as their value declined, having not been indexed for inflation until recently.
- The Board of Revisions’ appeal process can be unclear and intimidating
While there are relief programs in place for low-to-moderate income homeowners at both the city and county level, long-term solutions must come from the state lawmakers.
Property Tax Task Force Final Report by WCPO 9 News on Scribd
The report from the city is broken into two parts: state recommendations and city recommendations.
State recommendations
- Request the assessment process to be more transparent via more approaches to assessment or publicly listing the variables that go into the algorithm.
- Request the state give county auditors and treasurers the ability to suspend the accumulation of late fees when property taxes go unpaid.
- Pass a proposal that has a “circuit breaker” for homeowner and renters whose property taxes exceed five times their income. SB271 and HB645 propose a refundable income tax credit or rebate.
- Increase the income threshold for those eligible to receive the homestead exemption and increase the amount able to be exempted to $50,000, indexed for inflation.
- Among other solutions: create automatic enrollment in the homestead exemption for those who are eligible and create certain disclosures for institutional investors.
City recommendations
- Create an educational campaign to notify eligible homeowners of available relief opportunities
- Provide another $1M in relief for homeowners with delinquent property taxes
- Reduce energy costs for Cincinnatians by pursuing a multi-prong funding strategy to unlock federal and private foundation investments. A $9.225M investment in home repair & subsidy for low-to-moderate income households would unlock $28.8M in federal subsidies.
The report lists additional ideas that still need to be explored further. You can read them in the full report here.
