Beacon Journal staff writers

Glitch-prone computer software has delayed property tax bills in Summit County, and a few small school districts are scrambling to line up last-minute loans to cover the shortfall.

County Treasurer John Donofrio expects to mail about 260,000 tax bills for the first half of the year tomorrow and Saturday, and homeowners will have until March 14 to pay. That's about three weeks later than last year.

Three weeks doesn't seem like much, but some school administrators say even a short delay makes it tough to meet payroll schedules. If taxes don't make it to the bank on time, it's hard to pay teachers and other staff on time.

``I've never seen anything like this before,'' said an angry Marco Burnette, superintendent of the tiny Manchester School District in the southwest corner of the county.

Burnette said his district would normally have received about $1 million in property taxes by now, but instead doesn't have enough to make payroll. The district plans to borrow about $500,000 from the bank until more tax money rolls in.

He thinks the county should pay the interest costs for Manchester's loan, which he calculated at $65.86 a day.

The Woodridge school board was to consider an emergency measure yesterday to borrow $495,000 for payroll and other fixed costs, such as utilities, according to Treasurer Deanna Levenger.

Woodridge receives no state basic aid, so it relies almost entirely on property tax revenues to pay its bills.

Levenger said that the loan will carry the district through mid-March, when she hopes that property tax collections will be well under way. The county is expected to disburse $8.3 million in prepaid taxes later this week, but it will be split among Summit's school districts, and Levenger said it won't be enough for Woodridge to meet that district's immediate needs.

Copley-Fairlawn schools, another district that relies heavily on property taxes, has enough of a cushion that it can weather the shortfall, according to treasurer Doran Banks.

County Auditor Frank Williams yesterday blamed the delay on repeated problems with the real estate computer software used by both the auditor and treasurer.

It's not the first time software glitches have slowed property tax bills. Last year's bills for the second half of the year were delayed because of bugs that persisted after computers were upgraded to counter Y2K concerns.

Since then, the same software -- manufactured by Cole-Layer-Trumble Co. of Dayton -- has been upgraded again, with comparable results. Among the problems: Sometimes the software accounts for a property owner's homestead exemption, sometimes it doesn't.

Donofrio said he may have staffers work late into the night during the next few weeks.

``I hate to see the municipalities and the schools delay in getting their money,'' Williams said. ``We're doing the best we can.''

The Beacon Journal

-- Anonymous, February 15, 2001