Chair Manning, Vice Chair Reynolds, Ranking Member Hicks-Hudson, and members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, thank you for the opportunity to provide testimony today regarding House Bill 86 – more commonly known as the Gus Frangos Act.
My name is Jason Warner. I am the Director of Strategic Engagement at the Greater Ohio Policy Center (GOPC). GOPC is Ohio’s leading advocate for urban revitalization and sustainable growth, working to improve the communities of Ohio through smart growth strategies and research.
To begin, we would like to express our gratitude to Representative Demetriou for sponsoring this important legislation which seeks to make important and necessary changes to the state land bank law, and specific to the interests of Greater Ohio Policy Center, the tax forfeited land sales statute. I also want to acknowledge Senator Tom Patton who is sponsoring the companion bill to this legislation, Senate Bill 102.
GOPC is a statewide non-profit organization that champions revitalization and sustainable growth in Ohio’s cities and metros. GOPC is highly respected for its data-driven, nonpartisan policy analysis, research expertise, and policy development, and regularly provides expert analyses to public, private and nonprofit leaders at the local, state and national level. Our mission is to improve the communities of Ohio through smart growth strategies and research for a revitalized Ohio.
One of the earliest issues that GOPC came to legislature as advocates was for the legislation which led to the creation of Ohio’s 71 county land reutilization corporations, commonly known as land banks. Land banks provide practical mechanisms to address vacant, abandoned, tax-delinquent, and blighted properties throughout the state. Since the enactment of Ohio’s land bank legislation, they have become an important partner working with the state and local governments – as well as groups like GOPC on several important issues.
We are proud to call the Ohio Land Bank Association and Ohio’s land banks as an invaluable partner in our work on the clean-up and revitalization of blighted brownfields across Ohio.
GOPC has been proud to support HB86, SB102, and the other bills which have been introduced in previous General Assemblies over the past few years which seek to provide needed updates to the land bank statute.
Specifically, HB86 will:
Strengthen property owner protections in response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in the case of Tyler v. Hennepin County (2023).
Provide land banks and local governments practical tools to address blight and support housing by creating a new payment in lieu of taxes mechanism that grants county commissioners permissive authority to direct a portion of future tax revenue from redeveloped land bank properties back into the land bank for up to five years, providing land banks vital resources to redevelop otherwise vacant, idle sites.
Modernizes procedures to improve the land bank law, modernizes legal procedures, and resolves Board of Revisions conflicts of interest – all to ensure land banks can operate consistently across all counties.
Ohio’s land banks have accomplished many things in the past decade. In the aftermath of the foreclosure crisis, tens of thousands of abandoned, blighted properties have been cleared; thousands of homes have been renovated, and formerly unproductive lots have been assembled into numerous job-creating economic development projects.
Enactment of HB86 will ensure land banks are able to continue to accomplish these important works across Ohio.
Chair Manning and members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, thank you for the opportunity to share our thoughts on HB86. I appreciate the opportunity and welcome any questions the committee may have.