Ohio House Local Government Committee - 3-18-2026

committee to order and would like to recognize Representative Thomas to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance.

Thank you. I wasn't expecting the, well, would you like to serenade? Okay, let's see. Will the clerk please call the roll?

Vice Chair Kishman? Here.

Representative Abrams? Here.

Representative Creech? Here.

Checked in. Representative Lofton-Rowe.

Representative Schmidt. Representative Stevens.

Here.

Chair, I motion to amend House Bill 653 with sub underscore 2380-1.

This sub bill comes from the bill sponsor to cap late paying penalties, limits collection fees, and requires parking infraction hearings within 16 days of ticket issuance. Courts can refer judgments for collection with specific guidelines on agency fees, late charges, and itemization of cost.

Chair, I motion to amend House Bill 493 with sub-underscore 1924-2.

The sub-bill comes from the bill sponsor and would incorporate the previous amendment that sunsets tax credit sales for owner-occupied and agriculture properties. In addition, it would allow certificates for these properties to be sold only if the parcel owner consents to the sale. If the parcel does not get consent to be sold, it adds requirement that a lien holder would be notified prior to the sale for them to have rights of first refusal. This includes all tax certificate sales.

Hi, good morning, and thank you very much. Good morning, Chair King, Vice Chair Kishman, Ranking Member Sims, and committee members. Thank you for listening to my testimony today, and thank you also to Representative Abrams and Baker for co-sponsoring House Bill 517. My name is Eric Ruse, and I'm the Executive Director of the Hillside Trust. We're a private nonprofit land conservation and advocacy organization serving southwest Ohio and northern Kentucky since 1976. I have served the Hillside Trust now for 37 years. Cincinnati's urban forestry program was established in 1982. it has long been recognized as a leader in urban forestry. While the program has been successful, there are unintended consequences with the way the program is funded. In southwest Ohio, three land trusts operate within and around the city of Cincinnati, including the Hillside Trust, Western Wildlife Corridor, and Cardinal Land Conservancy. As city property owners, each one is required to pay into Cincinnati's urban forestry program. Specifically, the Hillside Trust owns 135 acres of land within the city of Cincinnati. These lands contain hundreds, if not thousands, of mature trees. They provide stormwater runoff, hillside stabilization, wildlife habitat, and carbon sequestration. We are responsible for maintaining these trees. When one of our trees falls in blocks of public right-of-way, it is the Hillside Trust's responsibility to pay for its removal, not the urban forestry program. Ultimately, we are contributing to Cincinnati's urban forest, both financially and by way of direct stewardship. Over time, the financial impact of these forestry assessments has grown significantly. For example, the Hillside Trust paid $2,944 in forestry assessments in 2014. By 2020, that figure rose to $4,344. In 2026, the total assessed fees now stand at $7,276. This represents an increase of 40% in the last six years, even though we have not added but one half acre of land within the city during that time. These rising costs are also beginning to affect our ability to accept donated land. In fact, we've already lost two potential donors within the city of Cincinnati. Chair King and members of the committee, House Bill 517 helps ensure that nonprofits preserving green space are not penalized for doing the kind of work that directly supports the urban forestry program. Thank you for this opportunity to present today. I very much appreciate your listening to my testimony, and I'm happy to answer any questions you may have.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for your testimony. This may be a silly question, but I'm the opposite side of the state, and we don't do this kind of thing. So I would like to know a little bit more, if you don't mind, about when I'm looking at the bill, what I'm envisioning is the trees that are along the side of the road.

And I wasn't sure if that's what you're talking about or if you talking about specific blocks of land that might have trees on them Or I just wondered if you could explain how it looks in like a picture format for your part of the state Yeah the urban forestry program thank you for the question addresses directly street trees

Thank you, Madam Chair. Just the second part of what I was wondering is, are these trees like pieces of property people would have donated to you, or are the homeowners that have trees along the side of the road receiving that same benefit, or to get the tax benefit do they have to donate that piece of property with the tree on it to you? Yes.

Are there any other questions from committee members?

Honestly, I don't know the answer to that question. I'm only aware of Cincinnati doing that. So when I was in for this hearing, I only understood it to be Cincinnati that has this urban forestry program. Perhaps other cities might, but there might be a different way that they're being funded other than a forestry assessment. Even though we a nonprofit and we don pay property taxes this assessment is charged on millage for all linear feet that abut either a paper street or a public right of way So there might be different options other cities who are funding their street tree program but Cincinnati is using this assessment

Are there any questions?

Thank you, Madam Chairman. Thank you so much for your testimony today.

Well, we have, as I mentioned, Hillside Trust. We have Western Wildlife Corridor and Cardinal Land Conservancy. And Cardinal Land Conservancy operates, I believe, in a five- or six-county region now in southwest Ohio. But they've been increasing their footprint within Cincinnati by increasing their acreage. They have one particularly large parcel down by the Little Miami River that comes into the Ohio River that has 60 acres with a bald eagle's nest on it. They've had that now for five years, and that is also being part of this forestry assessment. They could not be here today as they had an emergency, the executive director, but I believe that Andy Dickerson, the executive director, sent a letter in in terms of testimony to support House Bill 517, as did West Hawaii Left Corridor. We are the three major organizations that are preserving land within Cincinnati and within the southwest Ohio region.

Thank you.

Thank you very much, too.

Welcome.

Nice to see you, Madam Chair.

Thank you. Chair King, Vice Chair Kishman, and Ranking Member Sims, and members of the House Local Government Committee, thank you for the opportunity to present a proponent testimony in House Bill 139. On behalf of the members of the Ohio Chamber of Commerce, My name is Tony Long, General Counsel and Director of Energy and Environmental Policy at the Chamber. The Ohio Chamber of Commerce applauds Representative Thomas Hall for bringing this legislation forward. I never thought I'd be here talking about fire hydrants, but here we are. Until its introduction, there was a gap in public water asset management programs in ORC 61. House Bill 139 fills the gap with a fire hydrant maintenance plan. This hydrant maintenance plan is crucial both at the insurance underwriting stage for business operating in Ohio and reassurance that hydrants are in working order and useful during a public emergency. Other witnesses have provided testimony on the importance of operational hydrants for insurance premium costs. Many medium and large-sized businesses will utilize the public protection classification system as a factor in locating their businesses. Superior rankings or ratings reduce insurance costs and help a business contain costs. For smaller businesses, this new maintenance program will allow it to benefit from the PPC as well. And all businesses and local government benefit from a well-maintained and operational hydrant system in times of an emergency. Thank you for the opportunity to present this proponent testimony for House Bill 139. The Ohio Chamber looks forward to working with this committee and the Ohio House to move the legislation forward. I'll try to attempt any answer any questions.

You went off easy. Yeah.

This concludes the fifth? Sixth hearing for House Bill 139. So I'd like to now call forward House Bill 361 for its fifth hearing. and I'd like to call Vince Squalas with the Home Builders Association. I butchered your name.

Squalachi.

Please.

I'm Vince I. You probably know my son, Vince II. Thank you for being with us.

I'll just bounce around in my testimony. I can keep it less than three minutes. First, I'm with the Ohio Home Builders Association, a position I've held representing the industry for 49 years. I testified not too long ago. Very little has changed since then. Much has been said about the housing shortage, which may be a surprise to some of you, but it's certainly no surprise to us. I remember 1982 when interest rates were 18%. reduced rate mortgages were made available and people were camping out overnight at financial institutions just so they could buy a home that need is as urgent today as it was in 1982 in fact it might have even got worse take a look at the housing statistics which is I have passed out to you and it's very clear just from a quick review to that the housing shortage that we're in today Housing starts in Ohio the last three or four years haven't quite reached the 30,000 level. In the late 70s housing starts in Ohio were close to 90,000 units. Ohio housing starts per capita have been one of the lowest in the nation for decades. Why is that? It's complicated to build a house but you can build a house and we know all the different ways you can build them small large but no matter how you build the house you have to have a place to put it and that involves the land development process which is very complicated and can be very expensive in order to properly zone an area you have to have a properly written comprehensive plan this bill deals with comprehensive plans and the one particular section we like, I don't have a line number to give you, is in comprehensive plans that are adopted upon which the zoning is based, you must consider the housing needs of the people expected to live in that area. That's pretty simple the way it's stated and when people are putting together the comprehensive plans they have to consider the housing needs of the people who are expected to move into the area. As I mentioned land development is very expensive. The legislature has been very good to us. We enacted property tax exemptions to spur the development of land a number of years ago. It's working very well. I would suggest there's a six-year period. I suggest that period be extended to ten years and that will help the more rural, ex-urban areas where you don't have that much land development density, intensity. Sometimes it's harder to sell lots. In areas like Columbus you can pre lots In other areas it may take 10 or 15 years You gave us great minutes on ephemeral stream regulation which based on the way it interpreted which is indefinite it could increase lot costs $9,000 to $10,000 a lot. You've already been very helpful on building codes, where the residential building code in Ohio must consider the impact on housing affordability. I'm the envy of my counterparts around the country because the building codes in Ohio, you can build a house for $1,000 to $2,000 cheaper than other areas. My suggestion is all units of state government that have many regulations that apply to land development or housing should have the same requirement that you must disclose the impact of that rule and how it will impact for your building. The bill deals with the land development process, establishes time limits, requirements for an all-inclusive comprehensive plan. That is why we support it. We think it's maybe the most important thing you can do to promote the production of housing in Ohio to deal with the drastic shortage that we have. That concludes my remarks there, Madam Chairman. I'm happy to answer any questions.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thanks for being here, Mr. Squatchy. Good to see you.

So thank you for those wise comments. I appreciate it. But, you know, again, going back to Parma, we have limited folks in our building department. And sometimes it takes them a little bit longer because some of these projects are rather large. So could an unintended consequence be raises in building permit fees and the cost of going before the Board of Building Appeals and other types of fees that are passed on to home builders?

Well, to the Chair, there's no limitation on fees. I think the outstanding future of this bill, and it should apply to all regulatory issues, you must have a proper rule passed properly outlining it and regulating it so the regulated community has an idea of what that regulation may be. Financial and fiscal matters, I think, can be handled a little bit differently, but in any rule, particularly the land development that comes through the comprehensive land, should be based on a properly adopted rule. Therefore, before a government could turn something down, they'd have to issue an adjudication order. in there they would have to cite the rule of the ordinance that hasn't been complied with and then the regulated community would have the ability to correct it.

Representative Thomas. Thank you, sir, for your testimony. I guess my question is, I hear so much about problems with being able to build a home based on all of the regulatory issues. Would it help if Ohio had it, if you streamline the process for Ohio as a whole, so that all the various municipalities that come up with their own different regulatory processes, if we had a streamlined process, would that make it much more simpler for builders to come in

Thank you. Any other questions from committee members?

Yes, ma'am.

Yes, we are concerned with it. We feel, going back to what I mentioned briefly, if there's properly adopted rules and a properly adopted procedure with outlines for emergencies and things of that nature, that should be dealt with beforehand rather than afterhand. As far as the research that's required, that too should be required as part of the analysis that must go into any land planning that is submitted. So then the regulators will have all that information in place. I would think in emergencies, there's always exceptions for emergencies. So I would say if it's done properly, it shouldn't present a problem.

Thank you. Chair King, Vice Chair Kishman, Ranking Member Sims, and members of the House Local Government Committee, thank you for the opportunity to provide testimony today on House Bill 361. My name is Sherry Faringer. You got it very close with my last name. I'm a resident of the rural village of Commercial Point in Pickaway County. An unintended consequence, I believe, of this bill would significantly weaken local oversight for large industrial developments by accelerating zoning and approval processes for projects such as data centers. While economic development is important, this bill removes the careful review that rural communities depend on to protect our environment infrastructure and quality of life Rural zoning processes exist for a reason They allow residents, local governments, and planning boards to evaluate whether a proposed project is compatible with the surrounding community. Data centers are not small developments. They are massive industrial facilities that require large amounts of land, electricity, water, transmission infrastructure, and constant cooling systems. These facilities can fundamentally transform rural landscapes that were never intended to host industrial-scale operations. They certainly do not belong near residential areas. Fast-tracking approvals limits the ability of local officials and residents to assess the long-term impacts of these projects. Rural communities often lack the infrastructure required to support such large developments. Power demand from a single data center can rival that of an entire town and the associated substations, transmission lines, backup generators, and cooling systems can dramatically alter the character of the agricultural or residential areas. Another concern is long-term land use impact. Once large parcels of rural land are converted to industrial use, They are effectively removed from agricultural production for decades. These decisions should not be rushed through under compressed timelines that prioritize speed over thoughtful planning and community involvement. This bill can undermine local control. Residents and local governments are in the best position to determine what types of development fit in their communities. Fast-tracking approvals reduces transparency and meaningful public participation in decisions that will shape rural areas for decades. I urge you to carefully review my testimony. Economic development should not come at the expense of local decision-making, land preservation, and responsible planning. Thank you for the opportunity, and I'm happy to answer any questions.

Bradley is with us.

Thank you. Chair King, Vice Chair Kishman, Ranking Member Sims, and members of the committee, my name is Brad Bowden-Miller. I work at Logan Union Champion Regional Planning Commission. We go by LUC. and I'm here to tell you a little bit about my organization, our planning and zoning expertise, and offer three comments on House Bill 361. LUC is a voluntary three-county organization. Choosing to join LUC are 42 of 43 townships, 19 of 23 villages, all four cities, all three counties. We have a large network. Because LUC assists so many local governments, it has a lot of experience working on comprehensive plans and with municipal and township zoning amendment processes. In the last 11 years, we've reviewed 170 zoning text changes and 120 rezoning That's about 7,200 acres. We've also reviewed 257 residential subdivision applications, I believe. Comments on 361. My comments are split into three parts. On the public hearing process, the bill proposes clear timelines for both the zoning amendment process and Board of Zoning Appeals action. It also includes a provision for automatic approval of zoning amendment changes in the event county commissioners or township trustees don't act in a timely manner. Automatic approval is what it's basically suggesting is that the study commission or the zoning commission's recommendation would be automatically approved, so it's not just the initial application. That could be made clearer. While timelines in the existing text of the revised code appear clear, there's a little bit of a catch. Public hearings are sometimes they have to be held within a certain timeline, but they're sometimes continued for several months, which delays decision on proposals. 361 addresses this by requiring public hearings to conclude and adjourn within 45 days once they're open it also provides flexibility allowing an extension if agreed to by an applicant it could also be made clear that it could be suggested by the zoning commissioner trustees basically it provides a more predictable faster review process but still provides flexibility additionally it makes timelines consistent across the different boards and commissions The bill also reaffirms language previously passed but seldom used in Ohio because the constitutionality of it was questioned by Ohio courts. Reaffirming the language is important because it enables counties and townships to create landscaping and architectural standards, effectively a site plan review process through the zoning commission. Currently, those standards are most frequently achieved through inclusion in the PUD process, which is an individual rezoning for individual properties, which ends up being subject to referendum. It's a much longer process, basically. So if those standards could be established generally as a holistic zoning change, it could be enacted all at once for the entire county or township. On the comprehensive plan definition, your revised code refers to both comprehensive plan and zoning plan, but it doesn't provide a clear definition and distinction between them. There's been a long debate about and litigation about the differences, so the bill seeks to resolve it by defining the requirements of a comprehensive plan. In short, requiring those to be updated within a year of the bill's passage would be a very large undertaking for the state, so that's something we're going to remain engaged in as this moves to the Senate if it does. That concludes my comments. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thanks for coming in. So could this bill have the unintended consequence of local governments simply rejecting plans and leading to long projected expensive litigation?

Follow-up?

I'm not necessarily concerned with it, I think, but I think it's important that it's the zoning commission's recommendation that's automatically approved, not the application as it is first proposed.

I think so. Thank you so much. Are there any other questions?

I consider the impacts of some projects. Data centers were mentioned before. In my area, we plan the area for a transportation research center in Honda. Some things just take a little bit longer time, especially like if a developer wants to propose something as a PUD instead of going underneath the existing code. They're essentially proposing their own unique zoning code for a piece of property. So trying to review that in a nine-day timeline is often a little difficult, and there will be negotiations and discussion about how landscape buffers should be done, how natural features should be achieved. And so sometimes that takes about 120 days to work through. But for some proposals, 90 days is going to work.

Representative?

I do have a question. With the bill's requirement that the plan must have land use, economic development, and it's coordinated with the Department of Development, I think, let me see, Department of Development. Do you have concerns that maybe the local control is lost in that and we're instead shifting to a state-directed central planning type of commission?

And, you know, all that technical expertise is hard to foster and develop over time. So it's not like you could just land at a department and say you're responsible for doing that now. That's kind of dispersed through the state. I think local control is very important because of that. But I think as we're working through this, you know, this bill is resolving some large outstanding issues for planning and zoning in the state, so that's helpful. But I think as we work through that, we're going to end up, we're going to hear our feedback about what should and shouldn't be in a conference.

Yes, so about half of our membership comes, half of our funding comes from membership fees. It's about, I think our budget's maybe about $350,000 a year. when there was maybe some discussion, maybe not some discussion, I never really fully understood about elimination of township zoning at one time or another. I tried to point out that we are kind of like technical advisors for all three of our counties. If we got rid of that, that's a problem because now instead of having part-time zoning inspectors everywhere, which is affordable, being able to use us as technical experts now, everybody has to have full-time staff, which gets a lot more expensive very quickly. So I like the way that the existing relationships work. Thank you, Chair.

About half of the operating costs of our organization.

Counties pitch in, cities pitch in.

Per capita.

Ranking Member Sims. Thank you so much, Madam Chair. Just really quickly, you know, during the number of hearings that we've had, we've heard a lot about, you know, and well-documented, the housing crisis and the need to help speed up. We haven't really talked much about the timeline as it relates to some of these other entities. As you mentioned here, data centers. Do you believe that the current timeline is sufficient enough to encompass both the issues around housing and these other entities, or should they be separate carve-out timelines in your professional opinion?

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you very much, Chair King, Vice Chair Kishman, Ranking Member Sims, members of the committee. Since I know you have a number of witnesses, and I know there's a time limit here, I'm not going to go through and read the entire thing. A lot of the individuals who spoke before have wonderful detailed technical knowledge. I will say that from the big picture perspective, the Buckeye Institute certainly has concerns about the housing situation that we have. We share a lot of the same concerns that both housing advocates actually have, business community has, relative to this in terms of improving the opportunities for folks to get here and improving our labor force situation. So clearly, we need to do an awful lot in this space. One of the things that the Buckeye Institute, obviously we're a free market think tank, So we generally are favorable to fewer taxes, less regulations, not no regulations, but less. And we think that this is one of the areas where we need to really kind of focus on things is the streamlining aspect of what we do when it comes to things like zoning, when it comes to building inspections, when it comes to permitting. In a lot of ways, this is a supply-side challenge that we face. Obviously, it's somewhat different in different communities because different communities have different demands and different existing housing stock, et cetera, et cetera. But I think one of the things that the one thing that's the big takeaway on House Bill 361 is that there's a comprehensive strategy embedded in the legislation that tries to make this situation easier, that tries to move things forward quickly. I can't speak any better than Mr. Squillis did earlier from the home builders who works with the contractors and does everything. that way, but I think that is something that we feel very, very strongly about here at the Buckeye Institute, is that we need to continue to be doing as much as we can to make things happen as quickly as possible with defined time limits, I think making it easier for the inspections to occur. All of those are various subsidiary elements of this legislation. When you look at it as a total package, we think it will have significant benefits over time to improving some of the residential challenges that we have. It's not a silver bullet solution. There never is such a thing. But obviously, moving in that right direction is something that we think makes a lot of sense. So looking at this total package, we're pretty pleased with what's in here. We think it will make a difference. So with that, I'm happy to answer any questions that members might have.

Representative Fowler-Arthur. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for your testimony. and I just, I guess, might be playing devil's advocate slightly. I'd like to know in looking at this decision to allow it to automatically be approved if the timeline is not met. We had an interesting situation in one of my local, we'll call it subdivisions, so we don't specifically highlight their situation, where they didn't necessarily want to approve something, but they wanted to approve something. Do you think that this could set up a process where when the folks that are reviewing, either the Board of Zoning Appeals or the subdivision, might allow things to de facto become approved rather than taking a vote that might be difficult for them? And would that be something we should be concerned about?

Representative Brennan Thank you, Madam Chair. Brother Lawson, good to see you. Good seeing you. I've been reading a lot about you in the plane dealer lately. You've been very busy. It's always nice to read about friends. Would lenders and investors be comfortable financing projects that were approved by default rather than affirmatively approved?

Follow-up? Proceed. Thanks. Kind of piggybacking off of that question, the answer is probably very similar. Or could title insurers or banks view a deemed approved project as legally riskier and slowing down financing or increasing costs? Through the chair and Representative Brennan,

Always has good answers. Thank you, Madam Chair. Any other questions?

So Chair King I think that one of the I be candid I grown over the years to have concerns about some things that happen at the local level as a broader matter not just in the context of this legislation And I think we're starting to see that kind of tension between the state and locals in many, many different areas, again, not just isolated to this. So while there was a time when I probably would have said that I would have had a concern along those lines for some of the reasons I think that you're alluding to, I think I have less concern now because I think we need a framework that is understandable across the board that various actors, again, both from the government standpoint as well as the development standpoint, can understand. So everything is not necessarily perfect. I'd love to say local control is the greatest thing. I'm not sure that I've evolved in those views a little bit over the years because of some of the things that I've seen happen over time. So I have less concern in that space than I probably would have had if you had asked me this even five years ago.

I was so excited to take my husband's last name so people could pronounce my name. Now they just forget my first name. Everyone calls me Ashley, so I'm used to it. Chair King, Vice Chair Kishman, Ranking Member Sims and representatives on the local government committee, thank you for the opportunity to provide IP testimony on sub-house bill 361. AGC of Ohio is a construction association representing large and small union open shop commercial and industrial builders. We work with building departments from the very start of the project, during the plan approval process, throughout the building inspection process, and until the owner receives his occupancy permits. We appreciate representatives Lorenz and Fisher willingness to work with AGC and other stakeholders to address concerns with some of the initial proposals in the bill particularly related to building departments and their operational requirements. Ohio's building code system has long relied on a clear division of responsibilities. The legislature establishes the statutory framework and the Ohio Board of Building Standards, or BBS, develops the technical and administrative requirements, and that all goes through rule in BBS's public hearings. Ohio law intentionally structured BBS, and this is thanks to the legislature a number of years ago, to include a broad range of expertise from across the construction industry and regulatory bodies. Through this structure and its rulemaking process, SBBS evaluates issues such as plan review timelines, inspection requirements, building partner certification, and inspector qualifications with the technical expertise and significant stakeholder input. This process also provides many opportunities for public comment in addition to the general rulemaking process with the common sense initiative review and legislative oversight for JCAR. Because these issues are highly technical and operational, AGC firmly believes that they are best addressed through BBS in its process rather than in statute as part of the initial bill had in place. Maintaining their authority helps ensure Ohio's building code systems remains technically sound, adaptable, and responsible to the needs of those who utilize it. We appreciate the bill's sponsors and this committee for your work on this legislation and willingness to address the industry's concerns and to take on something like zoning, which I am not addressing at all in my testimony. So that concludes my testimony. I'm happy to answer any questions.