Voters defeat Akron income tax increase
Richfield bond issue fails, but
road levy passes;
Medina County sales tax passes, library levy fails
By Kathleen Collins, Kathleen
Folkerth and Stephanie Kist
SUMMIT/MEDINA COUNTIES — Voters living in Summit and Medina counties took to the polls for the May 8 Special Election.
According to the Summit County Board of Elections, voter turnout was at 16 percent, with 42,865 voters out of 264,421 registered voters voting in the election.
“We expected low voter turnout,” said Steve Kotsatos, assistant to the director at the Board of Elections. “We knew it would be low when we saw that only 40 voters had voted by 10 a.m. at some places.
“But overall, everything ran smooth,” he added.
In Medina County, the voter turnout number was not available by presstime. Only a small portion of the West Side Leader’s coverage area — Akron and Richfield Township in Summit County, and Sharon and Granger townships in Medina County — voted in the election.
The following is a description of election results.
SUMMIT COUNTY
Akron
Turnout was light in Akron, but the majority of those who did go to the polls voted against Issue No. 17, a proposal to raise Akron’s income tax .33 percent, from 2.25 percent to 2.58 percent. Akron Mayor Don Plusquellic conceded defeat by 8:45 p.m. election night. The mayor said the final outcome of 66 percent against the income tax increase was “probably not what we expected.”
According to the Board of Elections, 11,489 residents voted against the increase, while 5,913 supported it.
“The public’s spoken,” Plusquellic told those gathered at the Polish-American Hall in North Akron following the final results of the vote.
Plusquellic had campaigned heavily
for the increase during the past few months. Of the
$18.1 million expected to
be generated by the increase, half of it would have
gone toward economic development projects in the city,
$2.5 million to hiring an additional 25 police officers,
$3.6 million to neighborhood improvements and $1 million
each to flood control, after-school programs in the
city’s community learning centers and replacement
of equipment.
Only Akron residents could vote
on the issue, but the tax would have been paid by anyone
who works in Akron or one of its Joint Economic Development
Districts, as well as Akron residents who earn income
that is taxable.
In his remarks, the mayor cited
several reasons why he thinks Issue No. 17 failed to
win over voters.
“People are more upset with
government in general than I’ve ever seen in 30
years,” Plusquellic said. “Gas prices, the
economy in general, the angst over losing jobs is the
worst I’ve seen.”
He added that the increase would
have been the first in 26 years, although voters in
2003 approved a .25 percent increase to fund the Akron
Public Schools District’s school construction
projects.
“Somehow we didn’t
get the message out,” Plusquellic said. “I’ll
take responsibility for that.”
He noted that he believed he was
able to convince voters he spoke to personally to support
the issue. The mayor also stressed that he believed
it was important to be honest with voters about the
need for the increase in Akron, even though he’s
facing an election himself in the coming months.
“It would have been awfully
easy to tell people what they want to hear,” he
said.
Plusquellic did not indicate that
he wants to put the issue back on the ballot again anytime
soon.
“We’re going to do
our best to make this city work with what we have,”
he said.
Richfield Township
Township voters overwhelmingly
defeated Issue No. 2, a bond issue that would provide
funds for a new township office and recreation building,
but approved Issue No. 3, a road levy.
According to the Board of Elections,
the bond issue failed by a 64 percent to 36 percent
margin, with 218 residents voting against it and 124
in favor of it. The bond issue also was defeated —
by 25 votes — in this past November’s election.
“I’m disappointed,
but not surprised,” said Trustee Dave Wyatt. “There
was some sentiment among residents who were against
it.”
According to Trustee Laurie Peters
Gilmore, the 20-year, 0.5-mill bond issue would have
raised approximately $875,000 for the complete cost
of construction for a new town hall. It would have cost
$42 a year for the owner of a $250,000 home.
“We understand people don’t
want to spend more money,” said Gilmore. “Now
we’re exploring ideas for a new town hall.”
The proposed 4,400-square-foot
building would have housed the township administration
offices and also been a public meeting space. The 100-seat
public meeting room also would have been available for
residents to use for family gatherings and recreation.
The building would have
been constructed in Rising Valley Park, which the township
owns.
The township offices are currently
located in Richfield Village’s former recreation
building, which is owned by Richfield Village and located
in the village. Gilmore said the village is currently
not charging rent to the township to use the building.
“We don’t know how
long we can stay in our current offices,” said
Gilmore. “We just need a suitable office space
with a meeting room.
“We’ll look at the
township’s finances and see if there is something
we can purchase or rent in the area, but we run our
budget so tight, so I don’t know what the township
can afford,” added Gilmore. “We’re
limited because the township can’t own property
outside of the township. The township needs to stand
on its own. How we’re going to do that ... we’ll
have to decide within the next year.”
As for the road levy, voters approved
it by a 71 percent to 29 percent margin, with 242 votes
in favor of it and 100 votes against it, according to
the Board of Elections. The five-year, 1.3-mill road
levy, which is a replacement of a portion of an existing
1.5-mill road levy, will cost the owner of a home valued
at $250,000 about $109 a year.
Gilmore said the road levy, which
has traditionally been supported by township voters,
funds construction, reconstruction, resurfacing and
repair of roads and bridges, as well as the purchase
of road equipment.
“Voters have always
supported the road levy,”
Gilmore said.
MEDINA COUNTY
Medina County sales
and use tax increase
Medina County residents voted
to increase the county sales tax by 0.5 percent to benefit
the seven public school districts in the county. The
issue passed by a vote of 16,844 (56.5 percent) for
the issue to 12,980 (43.5 percent) against it.
This increase in the sales and
use tax is the first of its kind to successfully pass
in Ohio, said Medina County Commissioner Steve Hambley.
He said he was very grateful to
the voters of Medina County for placing their trust
in the school districts, which began the grassroots
effort to pass the issue.
Hambley said he was happy to help
when officials from the county’s school districts
approached him with the idea.
“How could I have turned
it down?” he said, adding the school districts
were united in favor of the issue.
The 30-year increase, which will
go into effect Oct. 1, will increase the sales tax from
6 percent to 6.5 percent. The revenue generated by the
increase — expected to be around $9.8 million
in the first year — will be divided among school
districts in the county on a per pupil basis.
The money will be used for permanent
improvements such as property acquisition for new schools,
new school construction, school renovation, parking
lot and athletic field expansions and replacements,
textbooks, computers, school buses and handicapped-accessibility
improvements, according
to the School Sales Tax Fact Sheet compiled by Hambley.
Hambley said it was a complicated
issue, and a concerted effort was made to distribute
information to every household.
“We made sure every household
in this county received information about it at least
twice,” he said. “I was confident that everybody
had a chance to see it.”
Still, he said he didn’t
count his chickens before they hatched.
“I’ve been around
elections long enough to know you’re never confident
until the votes are in,” he said.
The Highland Local Schools District
will receive $958,080 in the first year the sales tax
increase is implemented, based on projections. Money
generated by the tax increase may not be used for operating
expenses or salaries, the fact sheet states.
Highland Local Schools was facing
a $1.5 million operating deficit in the 2007-08 school
year without additional revenue, according to district
officials. Voters in November defeated an operating
levy that would have kept the district in the black.
Highland Board of Education members
have pledged to reduce the next operating levy request
by an estimated 1.55 mills — about the amount
of the anticipated sales tax income.
According to the Medina County
Auditor’s Office, even with the increase, 52 counties
in Ohio still will have a higher sales tax than Medina
County. Seven will be lower and 28 will be equal to
Medina County.
Medina County District Library
levy
Medina County voters defeated
a 1.25-mill operating levy for the Medina County District
Library (MCDL) by a very narrow margin. According to
unofficial Medina County Board of Elections results,
the 10-year replacement of the current operating levy
failed by a vote of 11,929 (49.3 percent) for the levy
to 12,277 (50.7 percent) against the levy.
The results surprised MCDL Director
Mike Harris.
“I felt we ran a good campaign,”
he said. “I felt we made the case for the revenue
that we needed to open up new libraries.”
The levy was intended to fund
the operating costs of new library buildings constructed
after voters approved a bond issue in 2003.
“Without local money, our
hours will be severely limited” in the new libraries,
he said.
The local operating funds, which
account for 38 percent of the budget and on which the
MCDL depends to run its libraries, expires at the end
of the year, so Harris said he anticipates pursuing
another operating levy in November.
He said there is a planning committee
meeting next week and a board meeting May 21, at which
time he hopes to present a plan for going forward to
the board.
“We’ll figure it out
from here,” he said, and added his thanks to “all
the volunteers that worked hard for us. I think we did
what we could to spread the word.”
The replacement of the levy
would have cost the owner of a $100,000 home about $39
a year, according to MCDL officials. This is the same
amount voters agreed to pay in 1992, when the levy was
initiated.
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