Brett and Carol sit down with Franklin County Auditor Michael Stinziano for an in-depth conversation about the property tax process, skyrocketing home values, and the upcoming triennial property value update.

As property tax concerns reach new heights alongside rapidly rising home valuations, Auditor Stinziano brings much-needed clarity on what his office does—and doesn’t do—when it comes to taxes.

Together, they break down the history of Ohio’s property tax system, the recent legislative efforts for relief, and practical steps homeowners can take to ensure their property values are accurate.

Learn how property taxes fund essential community services, what changes may be coming, and how you can prepare for the next round of assessments.

Whether you’re a longtime homeowner or just curious about local government, this episode is packed with insights you won’t want to miss.

3 Key Takeaways:

• You Can Impact Your Property Valuation: Homeowners should review their property record card for errors in square footage, bath count, or features. Corrections can mean more accurate—and sometimes lower—property taxes.
• Recent (and Upcoming) Legislative Changes: Four new property tax relief bills have been passed, mainly increasing the owner-occupied tax credit. However, not all proposals (like modernizing the homestead exemption) have been enacted. So staying informed and voicing your support matters.
• Resources to Prepare and Appeal: Franklin County’s "Know Your Home Value" website is a one-stop shop for homeowners to preview tentative values, review comparable sales, and estimate the impact of new levies. If you believe your assessment is off, informal and formal appeal avenues are available.

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Recorded in Studio C at 511 Studios. A production of Circle 270 Media® Podcast Consultants.

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Copyright 2026 Carol Ventresca and Brett Johnson

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The views and opinions expressed by the experts interviewed on this podcast are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of the podcast hosts or any affiliated organizations. The information provided in these interviews is for general informational purposes only and should not be considered as professional advice. Listeners are encouraged to consult with qualified professionals for specific advice or information related to their individual circumstances. The podcast host and producers do not endorse or guarantee the accuracy, completeness, or reliability of any information provided by the experts interviewed. Listener discretion is advised.

We are looking forward our way. Hi, this is Brett, and Carol is along here too, as well. Taxes are always a hot issue, and property tax concerns have skyrocketed along with the value of our homes. It's time for the triennial update on property values. It's also timely for our expert guest to provide us with more updates. We welcome Franklin County Auditor Michael Stinziano to our studio. We were just talking the fourth time.

Always excited to join and talk to folks about what the auditor's office does and doesn't do.

Yeah, exactly.

Well, what's a little scary, though, is that we're in our sixth year of podcasting, and four times we've needed the auditor here to answer questions that in some way is a little scary. Maybe if you could, like, help us tone down the issues around property taxes.

Well, there are people out there trying to do that, so we'll see if they're successful.

That's right. So, you know, thank you, though, so much to you and your staff. A huge shout out to your staff for helping us get you to the studio. We appreciate that. And we're actually turning this one around really quickly because it's so timely, the discussions, it literally changes minute by minute. So we pulled you in and thank you again for making time in your schedule. So, needless to say, the issues, it's the top of our minds in looking at taxes right now. We consider these rising costs on our homes and.

And the services that we need in our community. We need it all. But it's tough. It's getting tougher for people to pay those taxes. You've been in the auditor's chair now since 2019, correct? That's correct. And with many years of public service in other capacities before that. So we're gonna talk a lot about the auditor's office, but tell us about your journey to that office.

Sure. Depends where anyone wants to start. I don't shy away if the name Michael Cinziano sounds familiar. I was very fortunate to grow up in a house committed to public service. And as I tell particularly my kids or other young folks, before there was Twitter, before there was email, before there was the Facebook, mom and dad gave out our home phone number. And so if they weren't home, I was on the front line of constituent service. So having a father serving in the General Assembly, a mom that worked for the state was very fortunate to see the commitment an individual could have in their community. Working with community members and improving outcomes, that said, took a journey that led me out of state some time in Washington D.C.

came back for law school. But having those journeys really embedded in me, that desire to be able to give back and use that public service piece, improve outcomes for folks. So led to the opportunity at the State House, then Columbus City Council and now the auditor's chair. So. So it's been a unique journey, but one that I still feel immense value opportunity work with, as you mentioned, very talented people trying to provide world's best constituent service of what we can do, what we can't do, but making sure we're working with anyone that's got questions to get them to a great outcome.

Well, and you did learn from the best in the business. I know I've said this before, when I was in graduate school and your dad was in office, you. He took in all of my students to be interns in his office. And they learned a lot because as you say, you're on the front line of constituent needs. And they all loved it. And so a shout out to your dad.

Well, dad will appreciate that. We just had a dinner last night. And that legacy remains in terms of both getting young people, any young person that's interested in what in the world county government does, we really appreciate and want to bring them in. But also, as I alluded to, when we get calls from folks not only on property taxes, but on other public services, making sure they're not just given a phone number and a name, but connected on what outcomes could be there and making sure to the extent that that service can be completed, we're going to work as closely as we can with them through that process.

Yeah, well, residents should understand that the county auditors are not creating the tax rates or home values. You're just implementing the laws passed by the governor and the legislators and county officials. Of course, you're the messenger of a highly charged issue. Let's hear about your role in the tax process and goals that you have to set to deliver quality services to the county.

So, yeah, the challenge when people hear the auditor's office is always a great opportunity to educate them of what a county auditor does. That's different than a city auditor, different than the state auditor. But we are prescribed by statute. And so every function that's conducted, from dog licensing to weights and measures to that home value piece, are dictated within the revised code. And so for myself personally, coming from state house or council, where, hey, there's a policy I wanted to change, I can pursue it. I can whip votes, I can really put the groundwork in auditor's office is going to the state House and asking for advocacy, asking for them to pass legislation. And so that has been an area of frustration given that I've been on the other side of that table. But our role in terms of what the current law requires is every three years the auditor is required to update values within their county, their community.

And 35% of that auditor's valuation, not the market, but the auditor's valuation, combined with a residence taxing district, is how property taxes are calculated. And then I'm always quick to remind folks, it's the treasurer, not the auditor, but the treasurer who sends you the tax bill and you write the check for your property taxes too. I remind folks, if you do jury duty, if you're a poll worker, you'll get a check with my name on it to you. And so it's a little reverse psychology in terms of what we do and don't do, but it is all prescribed by law. There are clearly frustrations. There are programs that I personally feel could, could be adopted by the General assembly that would provide a relief for a lot of the concerns we hear about, particularly older residents feeling like they're going to get property taxed out of their neighborhood. But any resident kind of budgeting, going through different economic circumstances, not letting the property tax issue be one that is causing them to say, I can't stay in this neighborhood, I can't afford the school district or get the services that I'd like for my family and community.

So property taxes have always been an issue. It's not like it just popped out of thin air. But what happened was several years ago, property values skyrocketed and really it wasn't even. I don't want to say it wasn't a sensible process, but it just appeared because after the pandemic and housing being so low in Columbus, and there was a thing on the news today that Columbus population is growing twice faster than any place else in the country. So housing is going to continue to be an issue. That said, with these skyrocketing costs, the governor put together a property tax panel to review the system and, and make recommendations by last September of 2025. You were part of that panel. Tell us about those recommendations in this report and whether, did the legislature act on any of it and were there really any great ideas that you feel should have been implemented and weren't?

Yeah.

So I'm gonna, I love, we have a cheat sheet listener for the questions and I love how you put in quotes really great ideas.

I did that for me.

I just thought it was funny that's all. She doesn't do qu quotations. Read a lot of things. I'm sorry about that.

So I'm going to provide a little more background. So as you alluded to, this is not a new issue. These have been the process procedures for decades and even folded into that. It kind of goes back to the early 80s when there were different mechanisms and levers put in place for school districts that have reliable funding. At the same time, if a new levy was going to get passed, it wasn't going to become a windfall. So you'll often hear the term House Bill 920 or 20mil floor. A decade later you get the draft decision saying it is unconstitutional under the Ohio constitution to fund schools with property taxes. They go through three or four different hearings of draft.

Legislature keeps trying to find solutions, but never really moves away from property taxes being that main mechanism. When you look at your property tax bill, it's going to funding local schools. Then as you mentioned, we hit a perfect storm. You've got decades of under housing built occurring. You see massive population growth, particularly in central Ohio and so skyrocketing property values to the extent that the law requires what that property value is, reflection to some extent of what the market would be. County auditors have to follow what department taxation guidance is state law is and update accordingly. So in 2023, as part of that perfect storm, we saw historic value increases. What I share with folks though, we didn't have historic property tax increases where property taxes kind of followed.

In Franklin county, the value increase is when there were new levies presented and passed. But for two levies in 2023, passing 50% of property taxes wouldn't have been flat or actually decreased. I say it all the time. Your value can go up, your taxes can go down, your value can go down, your taxes go up. So driven by what is occurring at the taxing district and at the ballot box, all of that on background to get to yes. The legislature has said for the last two years the number one issue we're hearing about is property taxes. People want solutions. People are concerned.

So during the budget process, the general assembly put in some proposals that the governor ultimately vetoed. Didn't think they had had enough hearings, not enough subject matter experts some extent, I'll paraphrase, he thought it was rushed. That led to a commitment. We're going to put together a governor's working group. I was not on the working group. You had two auditors representing the auditors association. But I did testify about one of the proposals in Franklin county we have been presenting a menu of options of means tested programs. So other states have these existing.

They provide relief, substantial relief and real relief that people are going to see on their property tax bill. The working group ultimately came forward with about 22 proposals running the gambit of eliminating an LLC loophole, adding neighborhood stability zones. That's the one I testified in favor of, but also trying to attack the 20mil floor and some other areas that other counties were seeing as pain points on property tax bills. The General assembly, after the working group did pass four pieces of legislation that you will hear over the next four years is going to provide billions of dollars of tax relief. The bad news for anyone in Franklin county, they're not going to see a lot of that tax relief. The main relief you'll see is an increase in the owner occupied tax credit. So it's a tax credit that currently exists. So if you own your home, your primary residence, you get a 2.5% increase that's going to grow over the next four years, but it's not going to show up until the first half of the 2027 tax year bill.

Consequently though, they are also eliminating the non owner occupied tax credit. So if you had a second or third property that maybe you were driving income from, you're not going to get a benefit for that anymore. And they're going to eliminate the tax free holiday to help fund and fill any gaps for local school districts as we transition through this process. So there's still a lot of work to be done. A very long answer, but it's been a very complicated and a lot of moving pieces. There's still a number of means tested program, particularly modernizing the homestead, providing more benefit for older residents as our population's aging, making sure people are able to stay in the home and neighborhood they want. Property tax relief for those older residents is essential. You can do a tax deferment program that other states have where you pay what you can and then when the sale of the house occurs, then it gets caught up on the taxes.

You can do a circuit breaker model. Herschel Craig, State Senator Herschel Craig has championed in that for many years now in different general Assemblies, all of these continue to be discussed. They're in committee, but nothing's getting over that finish line. All the governor's proposals, I think we've seen what action so out of 22, four got acted on. I don't think the other 18 are gonna see any more consideration.

When you were talking about De Rolf, I can remember when I was working for the state of Ohio in the 80s, that was an issue. De Rolf was during the 70s.

I think De Rolf was 1988.

88, okay. But the young child that was the center of the case actually had gotten, I think he was in like kindergarten or first grade and didn't have a chair, had no place to sit in his classroom. And that's where the case started. He was actually like out of high school, maybe even out of college by the time it went through the court system and it still hasn't been enacted on and the Supreme Court stopped talking about it.

So I teach along with being county auditor, I serve as an adjunct law professor over at Capitol Law School and we spend one of our classes talking about draft. And it is always fascinating of kind of what was going on in the 80s. So you still had school districts utilizing coal furnaces. You had structures as those communities were transitioning away from being very blue collar to what other. What's our community going to look like? Areas of Ohio working through kind of where can we get money? Clearly property tax base isn't there. To your point, Supreme Court ultimately said we're no longer going to tell the General assembly how to do their job, just that they're not meeting that constitutional piece. And you saw a shift in the members of the Supreme Court that also was occurring during all of this. And so yeah, it's decades long problem that everyone's still going back to the General assembly, asking them to come up with appropriate solutions and remains even today a topic of what can we do, what should we be doing? And everyone's looking for leadership.

Right. And it's, that's, I think the reason that in my county, Delaware County, 85% of our property tax is for olentangy schools. And they've just opened up what, their 18th elementary or something and going for

a fifth high school.

Yes.

Yeah.

And also because the voters approve it.

Oh, absolutely. Well. And the voters are sending their kids. I mean that, you know, that makes sense. But. But it is. Yeah. That continuing that issue has made the whole tax system pretty squirrely.

Absolutely. We have very generous communities, everyone very supportive of their local schools. But I am hearing as our population's getting older, hey, I already paid for schools for my kids, I paid for schools for my grandkids. Why am I still being asked to pay? And I think that's a fair question as part of that older adults aging in place component of this complex issue.

Right.

Yeah, that's a really good way of looking at that.

Yeah.

I hadn't thought about that, you know, my kids, my grandkids. But now I need a little relief because we're all going to go through that cycle. I think it's a healthy attitude to look at that way. It's like, no, they're not trying to skate away from paying. They did twice, really, you know, through two generations, when it comes down to it.

But it's also that where there are people who have kids in school and it's not that they don't want to pay, but if they're not a homeowner, they're not paying for those schools.

Yeah, right.

Or paying much less.

Right. So that comes up in some of the discussion with the General Assembly. Some folks will say the landlord's going to pass off those additional increases to the tenant and what rent they pay. But the conversation I had when I testified was, well, should non property owners be paying or be able to vote on school issues? Now, as a former director of a board of elections, someone with go vote on their license plate, I'm going to always encourage more voting. But you have members of the General assembly thinking maybe that helps get the people who are going to pay for this more aligned of what could happen at the ballot box.

So as opposed to fixing the problem, they're seeing a lot of other options every day.

I hear a lot of stuff.

Oh, yeah, yeah, there you go. There you go.

Well, every three years, property values are reassessed. Your office has begun that process and will be working with residents through this year 2026. Talk about the process and how residents should prepare, how do they research their property, how to engage with your office and if they need to appeal any decisions.

Appreciate that question. Under Ohio law, every three years we are required to do a property value update. We aren't just doing it for our desire as much. Again, it's one of the prescribed responsibilities. So the minute the last three year appraisal ended, we start looking and preparing for the next one. So for the last two and a half years, been preparing for this 2026 update. What property owners need to be doing that is a benefit for them is understand some of the timelines, understand what that process looks like and make sure the data that we're relying on is accurate. So any property owner in Franklin county can go to the auditor's website, look up your property record card, make sure the square footage is aligned, make sure we've got the bathroom count, other features, because that's all going to factor into the calculation of what the value update will be as part of our process.

In the value update, particularly in a triennial update, it is looking at recent neighborhood sales. And so soon we have a one stop shop Know youw Home Value website where anyone can go and look at our, what we have deemed your delineated neighborhood. So we have tried to find properties with similar characteristics, land size, the history of the property so when it was all kind of built and the valuation is going to correlate a little bit of what recent sales will look like. That property card piece is a huge factor. And then knowing what's going on with their sales. So checking that neighborhood property card and then going to the Know youw Home Value website, then you can anticipate in June the auditor's tentative value being presented to every property owner. We'll mail it. It'll also be available on the Know youw Home Value website.

If you're satisfied with that tenant of value. You think if I, I'm happy. If I was going to sell my property, it's probably less than what I would get. I don't need to do anything else. It will carry forward in November, December. Then the treasurer will use 35% of that valuation with that property tax bill. But as you alluded to, if you think the value's inaccurate, too high or too low, or there's other things we're not aware of, we don't go inside any home. So say you've had massive flooding that's created black mold, or there's other structural issues, or you haven't updated the kitchen since you bought it.

There's going to be opportunities for informal property value review meetings where the property owner can present additional evidence, help us get a fair and accurate value of what's going on with your property. Those will occur. You can either submit the documentation, have a virtual meeting, or meet with an appraiser in person, provide that documentation. Under Ohio law, for any changes we make from the tentative value, we have to go back to the state. So then we'll notify anyone that takes Advantage provides documentation. In November, here's your final value which we'll carry forward. That is going to be the triennial update value process. If you are still not happy with the auditor's valuation at that point in 2027, we would encourage you to pursue a board of revision filing.

And it's another opportunity to submit documentation and make sure it's a fair and accurate value.

You know, I have to thank you because when you were here before telling us about the triennial estimation the last time I took it to heart and did all that information found out my house had incorrect information on it. So, for instance, it had my house down as three bedrooms and it was only two. And some other issues, which I'm assuming were because the builder probably provided the wrong information or somehow it was slanted. Anyway, when Delaware county sent me an estimation and I sent them that updated information, they brought the value down. And so as far as I'm concerned, the value is only good when I actually get paid by somebody who's buying my house. In the meantime, I don't really care about what the value is. I'm only worried about what's that going to mean for my taxes. So my neighbors were like, well, I don't want the value of my house to go down.

I go, well, you just keep paying those old tangy school taxes.

Yeah, I mean, that is. No one really wants their value to go down on the tenant of value piece. But what you want is a fair and accurate. What we see all the time though is, hey, you've had our square footage off for 10 years, but now we're gonna sell it. Can you now update it on the Hunter's website? And that's fair. You know, the data we rely on is only as good as it was collected.

Exactly.

I was not the chief collector at one point, and so we inherited a lot of data and continue through this process to improve. But property owners play a huge role to making sure it's a fair and accurate evaluation. And, you know, I have a 10 and 12 year old is not unheard of. I'll be at a soccer game and someone's like, hey, you got my bathroom count wrong. Should I let you know what it is? And I was like, I'm not going to go from here and update a record. But it's up to each individual property owner. But we are going to rely on that property card information. Any auditor is to do the update again.

And that can be a value going up. It could be a value going down well.

And I'm not saying that my value didn't go up, but it didn't go up at an extreme rate. That wasn't really. Didn't work with the reality of my house. So thank you again. And also, I guess this is a good time to remind the audience we're gonna have all of this information on our resources sheet when we post the podcast. So you'll be able to go back, get information not only from our auditor Stenziano's office, but we also have information on, well, if you're not in Franklin county, who Do I contact and what you do.

And to that point, every county's on a different cycle. So you may have just come off update year and so nothing to worry about per se this year. But again, at a minimum, we want every property owner to make sure their property card's accurate and every county will have that available and that you can work with them to say, hey, this is off and it's going to play a role one way or the other in the ultimate valuation.

Right? Absolutely. And as I said, I can attest to that. So we alluded to this already. There are petitions being circulated for signatures to abolish property taxes in Ohio. The group pushing this issue has not developed an alternative to ensure that the services continue without those tax funds. And we're talking about some pretty important services, including schools taxes. So this isn't miscellaneous fluff stuff being accomplished by our counties. So including the schools, what services could be lost if we don't collect those property taxes? And has our county begun to look at alternative funding?

So I'll answer the latter question. No. No one has looked at a turn of funding at this point. I think it's a lot of looking to the legislature that if there is the elimination of property taxes, the structure and system that they have created, what do we do next? And is that an increase in income tax? Is that an increase in sales tax? Is that just cutting services? It's a real unknown gas tax. Well, that is funding something.

Yes, yes.

But if anyone goes to a treasury auditor's website, pulls up their property tax bill, they'll be able to see the distribution of what their taxes go to. And in Franklin county, we're very generous in that. We fund a zoo. In Delaware county, we fund a number of senior services, a number of county functions and activities that are crucial for, I think, the quality of life and standards that we want for all members of our, our community. Schools will be the largest portion of any property tax bill, but it kind of breaks out at smaller percentages for a variety of services and county agencies. We also have metro parks on there. So it always helps folks of. Oh, I didn't realize that is what it's funding.

And then depending where you live, it could also be safety services. So fire districts, police districts. It really is going to break down on what's going on if you're in a village, township, city, and what voters have approved.

Good, good point. And, and it is easily found when you go into the information about your property in the auditor site.

So a lot of people pay their property taxes through escrow, through their home purchase. And so people don't really look at it until all of a sudden a bank calls and says, hey, something's off on the escrow. We think this is what happened. Well, we encourage them to look at their property tax bill, see what's going on. But property taxes continue to be a big reliance from the legislature and how we're going to fund services, how different local agencies, county or services are going to be provided. And so that pure elimination and there's frustration of we don't like this, we want to get rid of it. It's a fascinating conversation, but it's the General assembly that's going to have to act. But it would really turn a lot of the current structures, how local governments bond things really upside down if there's no longer that backstop of the property taxes.

One item that's often overlooked and misunderstood is the current tax system, the homestead property tax exemption. Can you explain the exemption, who's eligible, how it reduces home value and tax amounts and how to apply for the exemption.

So the it is a benefit that exists under Ohio law. There is always confusion because there's a lot of announced new updates being proposed at the General Assembly. So I term that as modernizing the homestead, trying to expand the benefit. They proposals get announced and then nothing's been passed. So there is a lot of confusion of who applies. Currently there's both an age and economic piece. So it's you have to be over 65 and make less than 41,000. And so that is a narrow pool at this point in time.

But one that if you qualify it is a benefit. It would remove the first $30,000 of your tax bill if you had $100,000 home, for example. So it's substantial, but it continues to be less and less older adults getting that advantage. So we get folks that hey, I've hit 65, do I qualify? And that $41,000 piece depending on how they prepared or where they were economically, we're seeing less and less qualify. And so trying to increase the economic piece. There was a four year period when Governor Strickland was governor. There was the elimination. So it was just age based.

We saw a lot of older adults take advantage of that. Then Governor Kasich came in and balanced the budget. He had the economic piece back in but grandfathered everyone in. So I hear from folks all the time if when my neighbor's getting it, I'm not what happened and trying to explain it, unfortunately it was a little bit of when you applied that's the biggest benefit. But there's also military disabled veteran component. There's surviving spouses of public servants that may have died in line of duty. There's other homestead opportunities. So every state does a little different.

I strongly encourage people to contact their members of the General assembly and seek more modernization, more effort. I think there's currently eight different bills pending that would increase the number of applicants that would be able to get the benefit. But we need to get it over the finish line.

Was were those changes part of that panel recommendation?

Modernizing the homestead was part of the recommendation. It was not one of the ones that has passed.

Yeah. Okay.

And part of part. And I can explain a little bit why not? So as homestead was established, the state would backfill for those local entities. So say you're going to get $100 benefit, the state pays that $100. So if you expand the pool, the state's going to be on the hook. Under the current structure, it's not like

somebody's not going to get paid. It's got to be filled.

Correct. And that goes back to, you know, a school district or a levying agency goes to the ballot, says we need to raise this amount of money. If that gets approved. That's what they're saying. Well, it was approved. The state's taking away the benefits. So the state put skin in the game. There's a big discussion that maybe they could put more skin in the game.

But there does seem to be hesitation. Why? Even though it's recommended by the governor's folks, people have number of pending pieces of legislation, nothing's gotten completed

in terms of the cycle of legislation. The bills that have been introduced and nothing's happened, do they die off on

December 31st of this year?

That's what I.

So the clock is ticking. The General assembly every two years starts over, starts over. So new members get a say. And that is part of the challenge, I think, both with term limits and institutional knowledge. So when you go down and talk about de Roth, some people have no clue what that is. We have some members that are serving that weren't born then, but it has impacting what previous general Assemblies did or didn't do. Where we are now.

Right, right. So this is the fun part of the conversation in the auditor's office. So we all think of that. He sends us bills and increases our taxes and does all this really bad stuff, but in actuality he does some fun things too. So tell us a little bit about our four legged friends and how the auditor's office is watching over.

So it appears the auditors weren't in the room and the legislature was assigning the responsibility of dog licensure. And so that falls upon county auditors. So yes, along with being the chief property assessor, I'm the chief dog licenser. And so it's a great opportunity to go in a number of communities, remind folks of that statutory obligation. We don't license cats, we don't license hamsters. But Ohio law requires dog licensure. So we are the go to stop for the licensing. But we have animal control.

If there's any problems. We have the shelter for adoptions. We are just another administrative cog in this wonderful county government.

And if you follow the auditor's office on social media, you often see some beautiful puppies in need of families.

We've had a nice success rate. I think being the head of the shelter you get some great publicity and get to hang out with puppies all day. But we highlight a dog of the week. We remind people of that obligation. We've got wonderful community supporters of really looking out for our canines. We call it protect your pal but want to continue to remind people of that obligation. A lot of people don't realize that it's state law. I'm not going to come take your dog from you.

But there is a public health benefit. There's a reason the legislature approved it and why we still do it.

Any other services the auditor's office is doing that you want to make sure we know about?

Yeah. So particularly with the weather we've had recently, that valuation is important. When we do the valuation, we are looking what we think the highest and best value of your property is. Essentially if a tree has fallen on your property, damaged your fence or if you've got roof damage or again flooding damage, you're going to not be receiving that highest and best value. You can work with the auditor's office to. It's a bureaucratic form. We don't prescribe it, but it's what we have to follow where we can work and make sure that valuation is lower and there is that benefit. If it's lower, there could be a tax benefit.

So we're again with what your taxes is attesting at that higher value or appropriate value and so wanting to make sure people know as storms continue and it looks like it's going to be a wild summer of storms, take advantage of that opportunity.

Is that only really relevant during this re estimation or is it.

You can do it anytime. Okay, Anytime. And so we've been really for I'm going to knock on the wooden table. Montgomery County a couple years ago had a huge tornadoes come through and that really highlighted how they could be more involved when you just saw completely communities taken out and destroyed. We haven't had tornadoes like that but we have little pockets where there have been damage in the destroy incidents. So like East Market would be a good example because they had that fire.

Right.

They could if they chose provide the documentation and we would update that value. That that would probably be something that they would take advantage of.

But you'd have to on the reverse though too when it's fixed you should

come back and we would say we

do you okay from the property owner's implementation or you just know, okay, we

local governments will share their permitting with us. So as they pull permit saying we should.

Okay, gotcha.

We get a lot of fun neighbors who are like hey my neighbor put in a whole new extension and they didn't pull their permits. There are eyes and ears as well for the auditor's office.

Okay. I was just curious and I was more of thinking of like who's obligated. You know once it's fixed, you know that's only fair. You need to update what's going on.

So yeah, some property owners do a great job of saying hey we got the work done, here's the update. Others kind of wait for us to catch the permit which is fine. Or as I mentioned we're a very popular website for neighbors.

Well that you know I'm glad you said that because now the work permits make sense why they're pulled, why that has to happen now. I get it. I just didn't realize it was a piece of that. No, we're checking because that damage was reported or maybe never was in going through that process. So. Okay, that makes sense. Yeah.

And then the other piece is just preparing for this update year in Franklin County. That Know youw Home value website is a one stop shop. It's a great tool. We also I have. It's not up yet but we will have the calculator of this is the auditor's valuation. What is this going to mean to my taxes? It is a snapshot of where we are in your taxing district. So I don't know what's going to get approved on the ballot. I don't know what's going to go on the ballot this November.

But it is a snapshot and has really been helpful. We get calls from people like wait, my value went up but my taxes went down. Yes, and now you could plug it in and we will verify versus me just running around the county telling people that can occur. You can see it for yourself.

That's good. No?

And again, to our audience, that information about that part of your site and all of the different resources are listed in our resource sheet.

The only other last piece is that taxing district component. And so as former elections director advocate people make sure they take advantage and vote. If you're ever going to have a levy or bond issue that could impact your property taxes, the auditor's office will send a value of your vote postcard. Want people to understand again that correlation of their taxing district is one of the huge drivers of what they'll ultimately get at their property taxes. So nothing is worse for me. They get a property tax bill from the treasurer and said, well, what happened here? And said, well, your community voted for X, Y and Z. That's what's now shown up. So the value of your vote.

Understanding that as a homeowner, as a voter, you play a huge role in and how property taxes do get established.

And you want to play that role with the information, the resources that you know how you're voting as well as what happens when the final votes and vote tally comes out. That's a huge issue that that information is out there. You can find that. It's easy to find online and make sure that you have all the information you need as an educated voter.

And I'll make another plug for the auditor's website. We have a ballot levy estimator and so you can plug in and see what that calculation would look like as well as a description. Because some bonds and levy issues can get very confusing. Just when you start talking about Mills and the calculation, we try to make it all as accessible and available as possible.

When is that estimator usually up? Because it would be for both the primary and the general, or just so

we will do it when early voting will begin. So there are some May primary levy issues. There's nothing countywide. So it I believe goes live in about 10 days when early voting starts for the May primary and then we'll do it again late September, early October for the November general, depending what's on the ballot.

So just before you're walking into those ballot boxes, regardless of its early voting or the day of the election, you want to take a last look at the auditor's website for your county.

Strongly encourage it.

Okay, Wonderful. Michael. We always ask our guests for last words of wisdom to add to our discussion as we close up Any suggestions or advice you have for our listeners today?

I would just encourage them to remain active that we've talked a lot about things and I always share with property owners. You play a huge role in a lot of what we do. And so don't wait till you get that property tax bill. You've had multiple opportunities over many months. Take advantage of that because it's only going to be a benefit to you versus some frustration if you had a property tax bill and try and figure out what just happened.

Right. If somebody goes to the website and they're having difficulty understanding it, they can, they can call your office.

Call the office or shoot me an email. Auditor Stenziano, franklincountyohio.gov We take a lot of pride and as I kind of started off providing the best constituent service we can, we've got great subject matter experts office is surrounded by a bunch of wonderful people. I try and get out of their way as much as I can. And so please contact us with any and all questions.

I was just going to say he just gave you his personal email. It is the place to go. So thank you.

Thank you. Yes. Many thanks to our expert guest, Franklin County Auditor Michael Stinziano, for joining us today. Listeners, thank you for joining us. You're going to find the contact information and resources we discussed in the podcast Show Notes on our website at lookingforwardourrway.com.

And we are looking forward to hearing your feedback on this or any of our other podcast episodes.