“They’re having to make decisions on spending,” he said. “One in particular, the letter actually talks about deferring maintenance. The other one talks about that she lives on $25,000 a year and $7,000 of that is taxes.”
That 77-year-old taxpayer said she is “on the verge of losing” her home because of taxes. “We are hurting,” she wrote. “We don’t get raises in our old rage of 70s.”
McNamara said he had not done an income verification to know if those numbers are completely accurate, but he believes they’re close. Even Homestead Act taxpayers are feeling the pinch.
“These are homes that people built with their spouses and their families, they’ve been paying taxes their entire lives, they’ve paid into the system,” McNamara said. “Now that they are on a fixed income, the system wants more, and those are the people, in my opinion, are slipping through the cracks. I don’t think that was intended by the legislature, I don’t think it was intended by the taxing authorities. But it’s a reality, and it should be addressed.”
Ohioans saw historic property tax hikes during the triennial update in 2023, where the average Butler County increase was 37%. Butler County commissioners and several communities rolled back some of the taxes, totaling $8 million, to help that burden, at least for a little while. County and state officials have been discussing the issue ever since.
Those local rollbacks have expired, and property tax payers saw an increase, though county officials said it was “slight,” between $14 and $29 per 100,000 of property value, the Journal-News reported in January.
Credit: Nick Graham
Credit: Nick Graham
While property tax relief isn’t happening anytime soon, one Butler County lawmaker is pushing for that assistance. Ohio Rep. Thomas Hall, R-Madison Twp., working fellow Republicans and Democrats across the aisle has he has introduced four bills this General Assembly to address property tax, including one on increasing thresholds of the Homestead Act, which hasn’t been updated in nearly 20 years.
“There’s a conversation, obviously, around property tax and there’s a conversation around ‘What is the solution to property tax?‘,” he said.
One of the bills Hall has jointly sponsored with Rep. Adam Mathews, R-Lebanon, is Ohio House-passed HB28, which reforms the property tax system by eliminating the ability to offer replacement property tax levies. This does not remove other taxing avenues, such as new and renewal levies.
There’s also HB103 which updates the Homestead Property Tax Exemption to reflect 2025 values, or as Hall called, “modern times.”
“The Homestead Exemption really hasn’t been changed since 2007,” he said.
The bill introduced by Hall and Rep. Daniel Troy, D-Willowick, would, among other things, increase the exemption to $50,000 of a home’s appraised value or cost and expand eligibility by raising the income threshold.
The General Assembly in 2023 did index the Homestead Exemption to inflation, providing a 3% to 4% exemption increase annually. HB103 is in the Ways and Means Committee, and the bill had its first hearing on April 2.
Additionally, there is HB156, Hall’s bill with Rep. Dani Isaacsohn, D-Cincinnati, that provides property tax relief to Ohio senior through a property tax freeze under certain circumstances.
“A lot of the conversations I’ve had is that, ‘We don’t mind paying property taxes. It’s just that we can’t afford the massive increases,’” Hall said. “We’ve decided to cap their property tax increases at a certain age and certain income levels.”
Hall said the Republican caucus wants to cap the annual carry over fund of school districts to 30% of the previous year’s budgets. This is also known as the rainy day fund where local governments can tap into in times of fiscal need.
Any funds over that 30% threshold, Hall said, would be given back to taxpayers. He said that could be a collective $4.2 billion windfall for taxpayers as hundreds of school districts are at or over that 30% threshold.
McNamara said he’s seen a lot of options floating around, and he wants to see tax relief just as much as his fellow residents and taxpayers.
“Everyone of us, including myself, would love to see our taxes reduced, period. But part of the population that is being hit the hardest in my experience is the older population that is retired and living on a fixed income,” he said. “We have been in a high-inflation environment for years with higher interest rates and increasing taxes. It’s a number of pressures hitting that’s creating what I think is a perfect storm.”
While the delinquency rate in Butler County is relatively low compared to other counties in Ohio, the conversations and letters he’s received may have long-term deficits for the county.
“If someone is deferring maintenance on their house, is that going to be a land bank issue in 10 years?” he asked. “I don’t know.”
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