Heath Hills TIF Would Divert Up To $48,546,905 From Licking County Services
Tax Increment Financing plans - like the one Mayor Johns has proposed for Heath Hills - freeze property taxes at today's farmland level and let the city pocket all the growth for the next 30 years. To get water and sewer out to the subdivision, Heath would have to borrow about $20,195,000 plus interest. A TIF lets them steal it from Licking County.
TIFs were meant for malls and factories that do not add new residents. This one is on homes — hundreds of new families needing county services, while the taxes that pay for those services vanish.
And if the development stalls, homes don't sell, or M/I has to drop the prices, Heath residents are the ones on the hook for the full $43,379,131 bond.
Estimates use the published farmland tax split for the Heath Hills parcels, applied to new home values at the jurisdiction's effective millage, with homes ramping in over a 9-year buildout. Granville Schools are held harmless on the TIF itself — see their separate funding crisis on the Financials page.
Follow the Money
Track 30 years of property tax payments from new Heath Hills homes. Toggle between what services would receive and what the TIF plan diverts.
Schools (~60%) are excluded — see Financials.
Emailing council takes 60 seconds. Let them know that you do not support the idea of placing a TIF on a major residential project like this.
Contact Heath City CouncilWhat about Granville Schools?
The TIF "holds schools harmless" with 100% compensation payments. But being protected from the TIF is cold comfort when the $2,917,069/yr in new tax revenue is a fraction of the $12,000,000/yr cost to educate ~874 new students at 546 homes. The July draft adds “Additional School Payments” worth roughly $240,000/yr at full buildout — about 2 cents per dollar of new operating cost — written as intent, not obligation, and temporary where the costs are permanent. That's a separate, enormous crisis.
The Agreement Now Answers Some Questions — But Hides the Rest
The July 13 draft development agreement and the city's Baker Tilly financial summary now answer two questions the site first raised in May — and paper over a third:
- ✓Bond size & schedule: ~$20.2M notes (2027) refunded by ~$20.1M 35-year GO bonds to 2067; $43,379,131 total debt service.
- ∼School “revenue sharing”: exists on paper — as non-binding “intent” worth ~2% of the operating gap (2.25 mills × 20 yrs + 1 mill × 15 yrs if the school opens; ~$240k/yr vs. ~$12M/yr), funded from NCA charges Heath controls “in the City's sole discretion.”
- ✓No M/I Homes repayment: the earlier $6M / 7% reimbursement is gone — roads are the developer's sole cost.
Still missing from the public record:
- •Which taxing entities' growth is diverted into the TIF, and at what frozen baseline
- •A public cost-benefit analysis showing the impact on every county, township, and park service that loses revenue for 30 years
- •What happens to Heath's general fund if the projected ~1.32x coverage doesn't materialize — the bonds are general obligation, so Heath's income tax is pledged
- •Why the city chose 35-year bonds that throw off a surplus every year — instead of smaller or shorter debt that pays the pipes off and ends the TIF sooner. Paying debt down early was possible. This plan deliberately doesn't.
The draft and financing plan were finally presented at the public July 13 Community Development & Zoning Committee meeting. These are exactly the financial terms the public — in both Heath and the rest of Licking County — deserves debated in the open before the August 3 vote.
The $6M / 7% developer payout was removed — roads are now M/I Homes' sole cost.
The July 13 draft deletes the May draft's plan to reimburse M/I Homes up to $6,000,000 for roadwork at 7% interest from the TIF. Under the new agreement, the Roadway Improvements — Canyon/Seminary widening and the three-way stop — are "constructed by the Developer at its sole cost and expense." The same draft added the “504-home cap,” the school-site donation, and the “Additional School Payments” — each small, contingent, or reversible (see below).
What M/I Homes still receives: the 30-year, 100% TIF exemption on its unsold inventory during its ownership periods, and the road right-of-way dedications the City needs. TIF service payments now flow entirely to the City "for any lawful purpose" after school compensation — not back to the developer.
The May 2026 draft would have paid M/I Homes up to $6M at 7% interest — compounding monthly the entire time Heath's own bond was repaid first. Our earlier model showed M/I collecting up to ~$25.3M (principal + interest) and still being owed money at year 30. That provision is gone from the July draft; what replaced it is the subject of this page. The superseded May draft remains in the document archive for reference.
Updated July 2026. Figures are estimates derived from the published farmland tax distribution for the Heath Hills parcels, applied to new home values at the jurisdiction's effective millage (41.44 mills), with 546 homes ramping in over a 9-year buildout. The city's infrastructure debt is $20,195,000 of 5-year notes (dated 12/1/2027) refunded by $20,135,000 of 35-year general obligation bonds maturing 12/1/2067 — $43,379,131 in total debt service through 2067, per the Baker Tilly financial summary [FIN]; the bonds are general obligation, so Heath's general fund and income tax are pledged if TIF/NCA revenues fall short. The model applies the actual year-by-year debt-service schedule from [FIN]; bond payments are split into principal vs. interest at [FIN]'s aggregate ratio ($20,135,000 principal / $23,244,131 net interest), and the notes' pre-refunding payments (2029–2031) were interest-only. The $32,549,761 phase figure covers only payments due inside the 30-year TIF window; the remaining $12,918,567 (2057–2067) is owed after the TIF expires. The "leftover pile" is increment above the scheduled bond payments: during the TIF it stays in the city's TIF fund for purposes Heath designates (“any lawful purpose,” NEW-DA §11(a)(iv)); any surplus transfers to the General Fund when the fund dissolves (Ohio Rev. Code §5709.43). The May draft's $6M / 7% reimbursement to M/I Homes is gone (NEW-DA §7(b)). Schools receive 100% TIF compensation (§11(a)(i)) plus the "Additional School Payments" (2.25 mills × 20 yrs; 1 mill × 15 yrs contingent on the school opening, §11(c)); the NCA charge is capped at 7.5 mills (§11(b)). Their operating shortfall is detailed on the Financials page. Cross-check: the city's own [FIN] deck projects $58.0M in "economic development revenues" through 2067 — that figure spans 2033–2067 and includes NCA charges, so it runs longer than this 30-year TIF model and is not directly comparable to the $48,546,905 non-school diversion shown here.