Dennison suing Uhrichsville over missed tax-sharing payments
NEW PHILADELPHIA (WJER) (Feb. 18, 2022) – Dennison is taking its dispute with the City of Uhrichsville over a decades-old tax sharing agreement to court. Attorneys representing the village filed a civil complaint in Tuscarawas County Common Pleas Court Friday afternoon alleging breach of contract and requesting $18,000 in damages plus interest. The development comes following a more than 30-minute closed-door session at the end of Thursday night’s council meeting to discuss pending litigation.
The agreement from 1998 entitles Dennison to 37-percent of the payroll taxes the city collects from Claymont High School. Uhrichsville Mayor Mark Haney stopped the payments in 2020 after a Columbus-area law firm he had review the agreement deemed it invalid. City council ended up overriding him and authorizing a lump sum payment for all of 2020. Members voted to do the same for 2021, but the village has yet to receive a check for its share of the taxes that year. Dennison is also seeking a court order requiring Claymont to start paying the village its share of the taxes directly.
Haney issued a statement late Friday afternoon saying it was unfortunate that Dennison had chosen this path. He says he had no intentions of taking the village to court to seek reimbursement for past payments made under the agreement based on the law firm’s opinion.