Holmes County road sales tax returns to ballot

A Holmes County undertaking that has made Holmes County’s byways among the best in the state is heading back to the November ballot.

The county hopes to see overwhelming support of the Holmes County Sales Tax Levy, which has helped maintain the county’s roads for the past decade.

The tax levy is a renewal of the existing levy, providing revenue for county permanent improvements for a five-year period of one quarter of 1%.

The levy has traditionally received strong support over the years, and the funds can only be put toward the maintenance and upgrading of county roads.

In addition, 10% of the revenue brought in through the levy will be doled out evenly among the county’s townships for trustees to utilize in the improvement and upkeep of township roads.

According to the Holmes County Commissioners, which met with Holmes County engineer Chris Young and assistant engineer Josh Galbraith Monday, June 1, this program has been a win-win for everyone in Holmes County because it creates the best possible roadways and 80% of the revenue sales tax generated comes from the tourism industry, meaning a large percentage of the funding is coming from outside the county.

According to county extension office figures, the tax levy supplies approximately one-third of the organization’s tax dollar funding. Melway Paving has done all the paving throughout the 10-year process.

Over the first decade of the sales tax program, the county has been able to pave all the county’s roadways, even doubling back to do additional work on several roads.

Galbraith said the tax funding being generated today compared to 10 years ago when the program began is $3.3 million, compared to about $2 million a decade ago.

“I’ve heard nothing but good stuff about it, and without a doubt we have the best county roads in the state of Ohio,” Commissioner Joe Miller said.

Young said one of the focal points moving forward, should the levy continue to pass, is creating more bike lanes.

“That’s the future," Young said. “The thing I like about (the levy) is that people can judge us every five years and hold us accountable if they don’t like what we did by not voting for it.”

Commissioner Dave Hall said the popularity of this levy shows people understand the quality of the county roads causes more travel and use from both locals and tourists.

“We’re very blessed to have paved county roads,” Young said. “What we use this funding for is strictly pavement.”

He said it can be used for striping, where the county uses 6-inch striping because that has been proven safer than thinner striping, and they also create tapered safety edges that allow drivers to ease back onto the road should they run off the side.

“What you’ve said you would do (through this levy) you’ve delivered,” Hall said.

Miller added his backing of the program.

“I strongly recommend it to the taxpayers because it’s a worthwhile cause,” Miller said.

Young said there is roughly 250 miles of county road in the county, along with each township maintaining roughly 50 miles of roadway per township.

He also said since Holmes County put this plan into place, other counties have taken notice.

Young said Mahoning County got one passed recently, and Delaware County engineer Chris Bowserman presented details on a sales tax support levy.

“I’ve actually had multiple conversations about this with many other county engineers," Young said. “I’ve given presentations on it along with Chris Bowserman. “Statewide roads are underfunded, and we decided as a county we deserve better and did something about it 10 years ago.”

Galbraith said he has even had people from Indiana with large Amish communities discuss it with him recently, noting word of mouth from the Amish in Holmes County got to those communities in Indiana and got the discussion rolling.

After a decade of huge success, the county is eager to see the levy go back on the ballot and has high hopes it will continue to see the support it has received since its inception.