MAHONING COUNTY Hearing set in bed-tax lawsuit

The suit challenges the new law as unconstitutional.
By BOB JACKSON
VINDICATOR COURTHOUSE REPORTER
YOUNGSTOWN -- A hearing will be Wednesday in Franklin County Common Pleas Court on a motion to block Mahoning County commissioners from redirecting county bed-tax revenue.
The hearing in Columbus is part of a lawsuit filed against commissioners and Ohio Gov. Bob Taft last week by the Youngstown/Mahoning County Convention and Visitors Bureau.
Commissioners have assessed the bed tax on all hotel and motel room rentals in the county since 1987. In the past, all the revenue went to the visitors bureau, which uses it to promote travel and tourism in the county.
The tax brings in about $450,000 a year and is applied in addition to state and local sales taxes.
Airport funding
Commissioners voted Oct. 9 to begin using 2 percent of the bed-tax revenue to fund the Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport. The remaining 1 percent is to be given to a new visitors bureau made up mostly of county officials, leaving the current bureau with no funding.
The lawsuit says the law that allowed commissioners to make the funding change is unconstitutional and asks that it be stricken. The bureau also asks that commissioners be prohibited from making any changes while the lawsuit is pending.
Atty. Kevin McDermott of Columbus said the suit was filed there because Taft is named as a defendant and he must be sued in Columbus.
Commissioner Ed Reese said he hadn't seen the lawsuit yet and so declined to comment.
The suit says that the language of the new law, which was included as part of the state's budget bill passed in July, is unfair because it doesn't uniformly apply to all counties in Ohio. Instead, it seems designed to favor only Mahoning County.
McDermott said the suit challenges only that part of the budget bill that affects the CVB.
Critical of suit
State Rep. John Boccieri of New Middletown, D-61st, criticized the board for filing the lawsuit. He said the bureau complained when commissioners were planning to increase the bed tax, so commissioners backed off and decided to redirect the funding instead.
Boccieri and other local lawmakers were instrumental in developing the law that allowed commissioners to either increase the bed tax or redirect it.
"They're forgetting it's public money," Boccieri said in a written statement. "And elected leaders can redirect public money for the public good."
bjackson@vindy.com