Ohio Supreme Court rules boards of education cannot appeal tax valuation of property not owned or leased by school district

The Supreme Court of Ohio ruled last week that local boards of education are unable to appeal the tax valuation of property that they do not own or lease.

The ruling upheld two previous rulings in the case after Olentangy School District appealed to both a common pleas court and the Fifth District Court after the board of revision dismissed its case challenging the tax valuations for two property holding companies.

The majority also upheld a 2022 law that prevents school boards from appealing tax valuations for properties in their districts.

The district cited two sections of the Ohio Revised Code as part of the case: R.C. 2506.01, which allows county courts of common pleas to hear appeals of final decisions of a political subdivision, and R.C. 5717.05, which allows property owners to appeal tax valuations directly to the county court of common pleas.

The state Supreme Court ruled that neither section of the Revised Code allowed the district to appeal decisions about property valuations to common pleas courts.

“Board-of-revision decisions concerning the valuation of real property are not appealable to a court of common pleas under R.C. 2506.01(A), because R.C.2506.01 (C) precludes such an appeal,” Justice Daniel R. Hawkins said in the court’s majority opinion. “Moreover, property-valuation decisions are appealable to a court of common pleas under R.C. 5717.05 only when the appellant owns the property at issue.”

“Olentangy’s appeals were  therefore properly dismissed by the common pleas court, and we affirm the judgment of the Fifth District.”

The majority also ruled that the trial court correctly dismissed Olentangy’s appeal because board of revision decisions can be appealed to a higher administrative authority, the Ohio Board of Tax Appeals, under separate sections of the Revised Code.

The district had said that R.C. 2506.01 did not apply because the passage of House Bill 126 made it unable to appeal tax valuation decisions to a higher administrative authority.

HB 126 was passed and signed into law in 2022. The legislation changed sections of the Revised Code that previously allowed school boards to appeal to the BTA for any property tax valuations or to a common court of appeals regarding valuations of property owned or leased by the district.

Since the bill became law, school boards have only been able to file appeals for valuations of school property.

Justice Jennifer Brunner dissented from the majority opinion, saying that R.C. 2506.01 should be interpreted based on the specific order being appealed to a common pleas court, not on the category of the appeal.

Olentangy originally challenged the Delaware County auditor’s valuations of properties owned by Northport Place and PSLC Enterprises in an appeal to the county board of revision in 2023. The county board dismissed the complaint for lack of subject matter jurisdiction.

The district appealed to the county court of common pleas, and the real estate companies asked for dismissal, arguing that boards of revision cases could not be appealed to a trial court.

The trial court dismissed the case, and Olentangy then appealed to the Fifth District, which affirmed the trial court’s decision.

Ohio.News recently reported that state Reps. David Thomas, R-Ashtabula County, and Chris Glassburn, D-North Olmstead, introduced House Bill 608, a “catch-all” property tax reform bill.

The proposed legislation would return excess Real Estate Assessment Fund dollars directly to owner-occupied households, increase the amount of time that a property’s value can remain fixed if it is being developed as a future homesite, require that mailed notices be sent if property valuations change, and allow levy ballots to include statements that give voters clearer information about potential impacts of proposed measures.