Testimony on Key Issues

Ohio’s biennial budget bill is an important piece of legislation that impacts every taxpayer and professional in Ohio. OSCPA is closely working with members of the Ohio General Assembly and the Kasich Administration on your behalf.

OSCPA is weighing in on the details of the tax reform package, with an eye towards the interests of Ohio's economy, the business community and Ohio CPAs.

Testimony:

OSCPA Chair-elect Tom Zaino before the Senate Ways and Means Committee on Tax Expenditures, March 4, 2015
 
OSCPA President and CEO Scott D. Wiley, CAE before the House Ways and Means Committee, Feb. 25, 2015

OSCPA pulled together a task force of senior-level CPA experts with extensive knowledge in what it takes to have an entity – public or private – operate efficiently and effectively. This team developed a series of recommendations that would help Ohio's economy thrive. Since the report was released in 2010, several bills have passed to enact the recommendations. Legislators continue to reference the report as an aid in forming economic policy.

Full report
Executive Summary

OSCPA also issued a series of white papers that expand on key areas for reform.

Efficiency and Streamlining
Pension Reform
Performance Audits
Privatization in Ohio Government
Strategic Planning

One of the cornerstones of Ohio's economic growth is sound tax policy. OSCPA works with legislators to ensure a tax system that is simple, predictable, stable, uniform, competitive and fair.

Specific areas of tax policy targeted by OSCPA are:

Reforming Ohio's municipal income tax policy
Keeping the commercial activity tax low and broad-based
Ensuring the sales and use tax is low and competitive
Protecting accounting and consulting services from taxation
Measuring the benefits of tax expenditures to ensure the benefits exceed the costs
Reducing Ohio's personal income tax rate

Testimony and supporting documents:

Written testimony to the House Tax Reform Legislative Study Committee
Testimony by OSCPA member Michael Petrecca, CPA before the Senate Tax Reform Subcommittee
Guiding principles of Ohio tax policy, developed by the Ohio Society of CPAs’ Tax Legislation Policy Committee

OSCPA's top legislative priority has been achieving meaningful, common sense reforms to Ohio's municipal income tax system. Ohio was the only state in the nation where each city or village could make its own income tax rules and regulations. Businesses had to keep track of and comply with potentially 600 different sets of tax ordinances.

OSCPA worked to achieve uniformity of definitions, rules and procedures while avoiding revenue hits to municipalities. Changes were successfully enacted after the passage of House Bill 5, which was a sweeping victory for Ohio CPAs and the business community. Read more about OSCPA's efforts on the Municipal Tax Reform page.

Here is a snapshot of the testimony on behalf of this needed reform:

OSCPA member Tom Zaino's testimony before the House Ways and Means Committee on April 24 and May 7, 2013
OSCPA member Lee Beall's testimony before the House Ways and Means Committee on May 23, 2014
OSCPA member Tom Zaino's testimony before the Senate Finance Committee

OSCPA regularly fights to protect our members and the public from a tax on accounting services. Without a strong voice speaking up on behalf of the CPA profession, such a tax could easily become a reality.

House Bill 59 include a variety of tax reform. However, it also proposed a tax on countless professional services and a transfer of intangible property.

Read OSCPA member Tom Zaino's testimony on this bill.

A major emphasis in the Ohio Budget Advisory Task Force report was that enterprises, public or private, should be accountable to those who provide the means to keep it operating. Along those lines, OSCPA has testified in support of a variety of bills aimed at such accountability.

The DataOhio bills – House Bills 321-324 – aim to deliver readily available, consistent, data-driven information to government entities and taxpayers. Read OSCPA's submitted testimony.

House Bill 175 would establish a database that would make state government entities more accountable to the taxpayers who support them. This online checkbook would let taxpayers see a clearer depiction of Ohio's financial ledger. Read OSCPA's submitted testimony.

Joint economic development zones, also known as JEDZs, were intended as a tool for municipalities to spur economic development on underdeveloped land. However, some municipalities are creating such zones on fully developed land to raise revenue without the intention of using the funds to create new jobs.

OSCPA submitted written testimony supporting House Bill 289, which curtails such activity.