Community questions leaders on taxes

SANDUSKY — As inflation and rising costs continue to burden all, especially seniors on fixed incomes, a county agency brought local officials and residents together to discuss concerns and potential solutions. Erie County-based Serving Our Seniors hosted a forum on Friday at the UAW Hall on Hayes Avenue (Ohio 4) with local and state elected officials and local school district leaders. The event sought to explain how school districts use money generated via property taxes — an ongoing subject of grief and much community discussion since property reassessments raised many local homeowners' taxes in 2024, particularly affecting those with fixed incomes. It was actually at another Serving Our Seniors forum earlier this year where this topic was broached, leading to Friday's event. Several dozen audience members listened and asked questions to those on the panel, including: • Rick Jeffrey, Erie County auditor • State Rep. D.J. Swearingen, R-Huron • Caleb Stidham, Erie County treasurer • Denny Muratori, Sandusky Schools superintendent • James Tatman, Huron Schools superintendent • Ed Kurt, Margaretta Schools superintendent The forum, titled Understanding Your Real Estate Taxes and School Funding, was moderated by Sue Daugherty, executive director of Serving Our Seniors, and Matt Westerhold, of StayTunedSandusky. The hour-and-a-half-long forum is available to view at sanduskyregister.com and on the Register's YouTube channel. Friday's event built off the last forum co-sponsored by Serving Our Seniors and the Register, which focused on what Columbus lawmakers were doing to solve residents' property tax concerns. It was the third part of an ongoing series titled Real Estate Tax and Later Life. This is an ongoing discussion about how increased property taxes negatively affect seniors and what can be done to address this large-scale issue. Community concern Several community members addressed the panel with questions ranging from the cost of educating a single child and county efforts to suspend taxes. Stidham was the first in the room to raise the importance of looking into the cost of educating a single student. Daugherty then posed the question to the superintendents on the panel. The superintendents emphasized the difficulty in providing a simple cost due to the varying needs of every student. There is an increase in students with disabilities — whether they are mental, physical or emotional — according to Muratori. Other factors to account for are a student's economic situation, diversity, culture, religion and students coming into local districts from other countries. The number of students coming in from other countries is on the rise, according to Muratori. He said these students must learn language before they learn math, contributing to an added cost school districts must incur. One of the more heated topics of the meeting was a split debate over the county's ability to oversee and alter tax funds raised by an agency that is judged to have excess "carryover" funds. One resident described the action as "communism" and overruling local residents' votes. There could be a time when an entity brings in $2 million in tax revenue but only spends $1 million, according to Stidham. If this happened year after year, entities would have millions of dollars to potentially waste, Stidham argued. "The budget commission doesn't get to say you can't waste this money," Stidham said. "That's not our role to determine whether the money is wisely spent or unwisely spent. Our job is to look at the budget of what's being asked and say, 'Is this required or is it not required?'" In his opinion, Stidham said there must be checks and balances in place, so entities cannot have millions of dollars in the bank while families are struggling to afford food.