Stadium Law Renders All Pro Freight Stadium Tax-Exempt

Three years after the City of Avon applied for reimbursements in costs for building , the Ohio Cultural Facilities Commission authorized a $200,000 reimbursement to the city.

But as far as the home of the  goes, that’s only the beginning of the news.

The city filed a Board of Revision case on the stadium’s value recently, in the hopes of mitigating taxation. All Pro Freight Stadium “had been valued at $12-13 million,”  Lorain County Auditor Mark R. Stewart said Monday.

Now the adjusted value stands at $3.5 million.

“Avon filed the case, which suggested it believed the auditor’s valuation was too high and therefore that taxes would be too high,” Stewart said.

“But in testimony and through an expert witness presented by the city, it was determined that the stadium was so encumbered with a long-term lease to the Crushers, that the net income generated from this lease was not enough income to support a value higher than $4 million.”

To complicate matters even further, the state of Ohio changed in August of this year from “affiliated only” to include “affiliated and non-affiliated” teams. Teams in the Frontier League, to which the Crushers belong, are not affiliated with Major League Baseball franchises.

So effectively, All Pro Freight Stadium is now treated like all of the other minor-league team-ballpark relationships in Ohio (see also Toledo Mud Hens, Columbus Clippers, Lake County Captains, and others) and is now considered tax exempt in its totality.

“This really all happened through the state of Ohio,” said . “It became tax-exempt by a change in the law, rendering valuation of no tax value.”

Smith has said in the past that the city intends to to make up for lost tax revenue if the stadium were declared exempt.

The $13.6 million All Pro Freight Stadium was built in 2009, with its funding provided through a voter-approved income tax hike.

The stadium is located near the intersection of Interstate 90 and state Route 611, and currently serves as the home of the Crushers and Cleveland State University’s baseball team. It has also hosted events such as the in August and a country music concert last year headlined by Alan Jackson.