Mahoning Valley - Schools rely on many kinds of levies to bring in money from homeowners based on property valuations but some lawmakers in Ohio are looking to prevent schools from using emergency levies that bring in thousands for many districts. 

Schools like Poland have several emergency levies that bring in a combined seven million dollars. 

“We spend several million dollars a year in facilities…we heavily rely on this,” Craig Hockenberry, the Superintendent of Poland Local Schools said. 

Lawmakers who want to get rid of the levy say the term “emergency” is misleading because the schools are not in dire need of the money.

“The fear is for many schools they know that the voters are not going to approve what they have not been able to have a say over for many years and so that's where I think the scare tactics frankly have been coming in,” Representative David Thomas said. 

Getting rid of the levy would lower bills for tax payers but then result in less funds for schools. Some suggest if the levies are taken away schools could just put an operational levy in its place and make the same money.

“By doing away with this…you're pushing it back to the property owners they're going to have to vote on these levies,” Ralph Meacham, the Mahoning County auditor said. 

“If the voters or the homeowners would like to fully fund what's currently being funded for public schools they're going to be able to do that completely,” Rep Thomas said. 

If those operational levies fail, school districts would still get a minimum amount of money from the taxpayers with the 20 mil floor but for districts like Poland that minimum isn’t enough.

“I always tell them whenever I talk to people it's not an emergency until it fails them we have an emergency,” Superintendent Hockenberry said. 

Governor Mike DeWine vetoed a line in the state budget that eliminated these levies but discussions still continue in the House and Senate on overriding that veto.