News

Athens City Council may again put a tax increase before voters after the last one failed at the ballot

By: David Forster
Posted on: Wednesday, November 12, 2025

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ATHENS, Ohio (WOUB) — The Athens City Council is considering putting another income tax increase on the ballot after the last one was rejected by voters.

This time, the proposed tax increase would be two-tenths of a percent. The levy that failed in May called for a three-tenths increase.

A two-tenths increase means someone with taxable income of $50,000, for example, would pay an extra $100 a year.

City Treasurer Josh Thomas said the proposal for a smaller tax increase this time shows that city leaders got the message voters were sending.

Comments from council members at Monday night’s meeting suggest there is enough support to get the proposal on the May 2026 ballot. It will likely come before the council in the form of an ordinance for a first reading at next Monday’s meeting and will require three readings before a vote is taken.

It’s been nine years since the city’s general fund income tax was last increased, and the city is pursuing another increase because revenue is not keeping pace with expenses.

“Everything is going up when it comes to costs in comparison to revenue coming in,” Mayor Steve Patterson told the council.

Healthcare costs in particular are soaring. The council learned at Monday’s meeting that the city’s medical fund is in the hole because expenses far exceeded what was budgeted this year. The council will need to transfer $750,000 from the general fund to cover medical costs through the end of the year.

Patterson said he is trying to rein in expenses. The 2026 budget he proposed to the council for approval would raise general fund expenses by a little over 1 percent, a smaller increase than in years past and less than the rate of inflation.

“The budget that I put forward to you is shaved down as close as we can make this thing,” he said.

Several council members said that unless the city makes a compelling case for the proposed tax increase, they fear it will meet the same fate as the last one.

“We’re going to have to be very specific this year in telling people what this money is going to go for. … Not in general terms but in specific terms,” said Councilmember Alan Swank.

Most of the income tax revenue pays for the wages and benefits of employees, by far the city’s largest expense.

“It’s to keep the Fire Department fully staffed, it’s to keep the Police Department fully staffed, or staffed as best we can, it’s to keep the street department staffed, engineering and public works, the rec department, everybody across the board,” Patterson said.

If the tax increase passes in May, the city will not see any additional revenue until 2027 as tax returns start coming in. Those returns will continue to trickle in throughout the year, so it wouldn’t be until the end of 2027 that the city would reap the full benefit of a tax increase. This is why it’s important to act now, Thomas said.

“Our responsibility is to come to you and say we look at the numbers, we see the trends, and we need to start this now because if we don’t we just get further and further behind,” he said.