“We would agree with the judge that in the future, and we certainly have, to make more formal agreements with anybody who potentially might be using the facility,” Miami Twp. Trustee Chris Mucher said. “We won’t be doing handshake agreements again.”
A spokesman for the Ohio Attorney General’s Office said the state’s statute of frauds indicates that contracts must be in writing if the terms of the contract are to be enforced by a court of law.
McGovern, who had been The Winds wine store manager in Yellow Springs, left the bed and breakfast July 31, 2011, but the lawsuit and her counterclaim continued until last week.
“I was naïve also because I just took their word for it,” McGovern said. “It’s Yellow Springs. I have a good reputation there. People know me. I thought it was going to be fine.”
The tale of the mill’s restoration and rebirth as a business has been a mostly successful one that became complicated by a property tax issues.
Miami Twp.’s website says the township bought the mill from Antioch University in January 2004 when it was in disrepair. It also says it has a 90-year lease agreement for the land around the mil. Mucher said fund raising of private money and the Grinnell Mill Foundation helped restore the building by 2006. After the work was completed, the mill was to be a museum and B&B.
“The bed and breakfast served two purposes,” Mucher said of the original idea. “To keep the door open and use it for events and meetings or to stay on an overnight basis and to generate income to self-sustain it, with no input from township financially.”
The two sides in the lawsuit disagree on some details, but McGovern was to live at the mill and pay $175 per month in maintenance fees and could keep anything above that and business expenses.
But the property began being taxed as a business and residence. The township applied for and ultimately received a partial tax exemption and asked McGovern to pay it. She would not and was then asked to leave.
“We decided as a legitimate business expense, this was not something the taxpayers of Miami Twp. were not going to cover, this was a business expense that the business was going to cover,” Mucher said. “There lies the bone of contention.”
The township’s lawsuit sought $1,125 in additional fees. McGovern, who now runs the Glen House B&B a short distance from Grinnell Mill, had a counterclaim seeking more than $50,000 in lost profits through the end of what she said was a five-year deal.
“I had a counter claim because they took me to court, costing me so much money,” McGovern said. “I had to get a lawyer; they used the county prosecutor. It really stinks.”
While the parties agreed to walk away and pay their own court costs and attorney fees, the ownership and property tax issue isn’t exactly clear. Mucher said the township bought the building for $1. Greene County Auditor David Graham said he doesn’t think his office has record of that transaction. Plus, the original 4.5-acre area around the mill has now been incorporated into a 110-acre parcel after Antioch College bought land from Antioch University.
“There was a property tax (issue that was) part of this between the township and college,” Graham said. “The township paid a portion of taxes, but we only show one owner for that parcel. We don’t show any deed showing the sale. You can’t (own) one without the other.”
Mucher said that after McGovern left, Jim Hammond and Randy Gifford volunteered to run the B&B. Any money made after expenses will be kept for upkeep and maintenance. Mucher said those two are directors of the for-profit subsidiary of the Grinnell Mill Foundation. “It’s doing very well,” Mucher said of the current business model. “At the moment, that’s the plan for the future.”
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