Joe Motil, former Columbus City Council candidate and 37-year community advocate who is  circulating petitions to run for mayor in the 2023 May primary election states that, “As a [former] school board member, president of City Council and mayor, Andy Ginther’s decades-long practice of handing out hundreds of millions of dollars in tax abatements to corporate Columbus and luxury real estate developers has defunded public education to the point where CEA members have said enough is enough. If those on the receiving end of tax abatements and TIFs paid their fair share of property taxes, a bargaining agreement between the CEA and School Board would have been settled by now.”   

Motil continues, “The CEA’s decision to strike has been a longtime coming. Ginther, City Council and School Board members for too long have sacrificed much-needed property tax revenue and the educational needs of our city’s public schools and children, to fill the bank accounts of developers and  provide corporate welfare to our city’s wealthiest and most 'beloved' companies.”      

Motil further comments, “ In 2021 Ginther and City Council were nearly entirely responsible for the loss of $87 million in school property taxes and $21 million lost in TIFs. Over the last 81 months they handed out no less than $596 million in tax abatements and tens of millions more in TIF’s. Does anyone actually think that they recognize and care about the importance of public education over luxury real estate developers, corporate Columbus and its established institutions?" 

Motil concludes, “Ginther, City Council and the School Board’s generosity to those who put them in office and who have control over their decision making proves to be counterproductive. Tax abatements eliminate the hope of an appropriate public education that will elude the grips of poverty for tens of thousands Columbus Public School students. Our students and teachers deserve better. As a retired member of the Laborers International Union of North America Local 423, I look forward to joining my fellow union brothers and sisters on the picket line.”