Grandview Heights City Notes: Finance department ready to assist with income-tax issues
When we think of this time of year, it’s not uncommon to think of how busy we are.
For the city’s Finance Department, the holidays are busy for a different reason – working hard to close the books for the current year and preparing to implement an approved budget for next year.
Our Finance Department provides many services both within our organization and to the community. They have a proven track record of fiscal responsibility, receiving the Auditor of State’s Award for Distinction for excellence in financial reporting and accountability for the last 11 years.
Our team is responsible for managing revenues and expenses for the city to ensure we operate within our means each year, completing payroll, administering the annual budget and capital plan, completing required reports, creating a tax budget and assisting both residents and businesses with tax issues as they arise.
In addition, our Finance Department is focused on improving the ease with which you can see how your tax dollars are spent. The department prepared the city’s first Popular Annual Financial report (PAFR) in 2022, available at grandviewheights.gov.
One of the services our team provides directly to the community is having two income-tax administrators available to residents and businesses alike for questions or issues related to income taxes. They can be reached at tax@grandviewheights.gov.
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With the income-tax requirements having changed during the COVID-19 pandemic, we frequently receive questions regarding the state law. Under state law, municipal income tax is required to be withheld by employers and paid where the work is performed. Pre-pandemic, this meant that if someone worked in Columbus and lived in Grandview Heights, they paid Columbus income taxes.
When many employees began working from home during the pandemic, the General Assembly temporarily allowed employers to continue to withhold to the city the work was performed in prior to the pandemic. On Dec. 31, 2021, this ended which means employers returned to withholding city income tax based on where the work is performed. For those who are working at home, this is now their home city, or may be a hybrid of their home city and the city in which their employer’s office is located.
If you both reside and work for an employer in Grandview Heights, there is no need to change your withholding. If your employer is based outside of Grandview Heights and you are working from home, please ask your employer to begin withholding taxes for Grandview Heights immediately. Even if you do not work from home every day, your employer is required to withhold income taxes for Grandview Heights on the days you do work from home.
While it may not appear to matter where you pay your income taxes at first glance, it matters greatly for city services. Due to fact that many of the industries in Grandview Heights provide for work from home in a somewhat undisruptive way, we have seen a decline in our tax revenues more than most cities in central Ohio.
Our resources to provide modern infrastructure, emergency services, trash collection, parks programs and all our other services rests mostly on this local income-tax revenue. Ensuring your employer is paying your taxes to the proper municipality makes all the difference in our ability to operate. For additional resources and frequently asked questions, visit grandviewheights.gov and select Grandview Heights Income Tax under our “Services” tab.
Greta Kearns is the mayor of Grandview Heights.
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: City Notes: Finance department ready to assist with income-tax issues
