School funding in Ohio is a hot topic, and continues to get hotter as several school districts in the region have placed property tax levies on the ballot this coming May election. However, in Ohio, there is an alternative means than districts just relying on traditional property tax levies. These levies aren’t abstract ideas. According to the nonpartisan Ohio Legislative Service Commission (LSC), one-third of Ohio’s 611 school districts have adopted a school income tax. Many

Every election season, the same scenario plays out across Ohio: school districts put levies on the ballot, and taxpayers are told to vote yes or risk “losing our schools.” For residents across the Miami Valley, I have to ask: are repeated levies really the solution, or just a band-aid for a broken system? As someone who has watched local politics and public policy closely for decades, I promise you: relying on levies to fund schools has become the default, not the exception.