(A) The board of trustees of a regional transit authority may exercise the power of eminent domain to appropriate any land, rights, rights-of-way, franchise, power lines, easements, or other property, within or without the territorial boundaries of the regional transit authority, necessary or proper for the construction or efficient operation of any transit facility or access thereto under its jurisdiction pursuant to the procedure provided in sections 163.01 to 163.22, inclusive, of the Revised Code, and subject to division (B) of this section, provided that a regional transit authority shall not proceed to so appropriate real property outside its territorial boundaries, until it has served at the office of the county commissioners of the county in which it is proposed to appropriate real property, a notice describing the real property to be taken and the purpose for which it is proposed to be taken, and such county commissioners have entered on their journal within thirty days after such service a resolution approving such appropriation.

(B) Nothing contained in sections 306.30 to 306.53, inclusive, of the Revised Code authorizes a regional transit authority to appropriate any land, rights, rights-of-way, franchises, or easements belonging to the state or a municipal corporation without the consent of the state or municipal corporation, and no regional transit authority shall exercise the right of eminent domain to acquire any certificate of public convenience and necessity, or any part thereof, issued to a for-hire motor carrier by the public utilities commission of Ohio or by the federal motor carrier safety administration, or to take or disturb other property or facilities belonging to any political subdivision, public corporation, public utility, or common carrier, which property or facility is necessary and convenient in the operation of such political subdivision, public corporation, public utility, or common carrier, unless provision is made for the restoration, relocation, or duplication of such property or facility, or upon the election of such political subdivision, public corporation, public utility, or common carrier, for the payment of compensation, if any, at the sole cost of the regional transit authority, provided:

(1) If any restoration or duplication of any property or facility proposed to be made under this division involves a relocation of such property or facility the new facility and location thereof shall be of at least comparable utilitarian value and effectiveness and such relocation shall not impair the ability of the public utility or common carrier to compete in its original area of operation.

(2) If any restoration or duplication of any property or facility proposed to be made under this division involves a relocation of such property or facility, the regional transit authority shall acquire no interest or right in or to the appropriated property or facility until the relocated property or facility is available for use and until marketable title thereto has been transferred to the public utility or common carrier.

(C) When real property is acquired which is located outside the territorial boundaries of the regional transit authority and which is removed from the tax duplicate, the regional transit authority shall pay annually to the county treasurer of the county in which such property is located, commencing with the first tax year in which such property is removed from the tax duplicate, an amount of money in lieu of taxes equal to the smaller of the following:

(1) The last annual installment of taxes due from the acquired property before removal from the tax duplicate;

(2) An amount equal to the difference between the combined revenue from real estate taxes of all the taxing districts in which such property is located in the tax year immediately prior to the removal of such acquired property from the tax duplicate, and either:

(a) The total revenue which would be produced by the tax rate of each such taxing district in the tax year immediately prior to the removal of such acquired property from the tax duplicate, applied to the real estate tax duplicate of each of such taxing districts in each tax year subsequent to the year of removal; or

(b) The combined revenue from real estate taxes of all such taxing districts in each tax year subsequent to the year of removal, whichever is the greater.

The county auditor of each county in which such property is located shall apportion each such annual payment to each taxing district as if such annual payment has been levied and collected as a tax.

Such annual payments shall never again be made after they have ceased.

The regional transit authority may be exempted from such payment by agreement of the affected taxing district or districts in the county in which such property is located.

Amended by 129th General AssemblyFile No.127, HB 487, §101.01, eff. 6/11/2012.

Effective Date: 08-25-1970 .