JEFFERSON — The Ashtabula County Board of Commissioners voted 2-1 to increase the county’s sales-and-use tax by one-half percent and place the issue before voters on the May ballot.
If unchallenged, the increase becomes effective April 1. However, John Kusar of Austinburg Township told commissioners a referendum challenge will be started on Monday, effectively crippling the measure. The county cannot collect the tax while there is a successful referendum challenge awaiting a vote. Further, because of the timing involved in obtaining signatures, having the petitions certified and the required lead time to an election, the referendum issue would appear only on November’s ballot, six months after voters decide it in the primary.
The vote came after more than two hours of public testimony both in favor of and against the tax, and a work session in which the original resolution was amended to include the May ballot option. Originally, commissioners planned to put the issue before voters on the November ballot.
There were no surprises in the final vote: Commissioners Daniel Claypool and Peggy Carlo stuck to their stance that
the county needed to get increased revenues flowing as soon as possible to avert severe cuts to county services, while Commissioner Joseph Moroski held his ground of no taxation without a prior vote of the citizens.
“Certainly, the voters in May could very well tell us that they don’t want a sales tax,” Moroski said. “But if they do, we will have given them that choice and will just have to deal with our present situation sooner rather than later.”
That “present situation” involves a budget shortfall of nearly $3 million that threatens to immobilize the sheriff’s department and the offices of the treasurer, recorder, auditor, commissioners, planning department and clerk of courts.
Throughout the hearing and work session, Claypool spoke of achieving a balance between maintaining essential county services while giving voters their right to determine the level of county government they want.
“You have to find a balance. That is what I would propose … to find a balance,” Claypool said during the work session. “Taxpayers have a right to determine the level of services they are willing to pay for.”
Friction between the two viewpoints momentarily erupted into flames during the work session as Moroski and Claypool exchanged barbs over how to make up the $1 million the county will lose in potential tax revenue while it awaits the voters’ final say. Neither side could offer a plan as to how commissioners will salvage essential services should voters reject the tax on the May ballot.
Moroski went through a similar struggle in 2005, when then-commissioners Deborah Newcomb and Robert Boggs Jr. attempted to pass an emergency sales-tax measure. The issue went to the voters, who defeated it by a margin of nearly 4-1. Moroski predicted that, given the county’s actual unemployment rate of nearly 20 percent, the issue won’t fare any better in May.
“We’re going to have a lot of desperate, hard decisions to make this year,” Moroski said.
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Board approves sales-tax increase by 2-1 vote
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