Pacific Alderman Approve Property Tax Rate Hike

Aldermen Approve Property Tax Rate Hike - The Missourian: Pacific News
Aldermen Approve Property Tax Rate Hike
By Pauline Masson, Pacific Editor Posted: Wednesday, August 24, 2011 6:32 pm
Officials approved a property tax rate increase Aug. 16 following a lengthy debate between the mayor and an opponent of higher taxes.
Aldermen voted unanimously to raise the real and personal property tax levy from $0.37100 per $100 of assessed valuation to $0.3982. The bill was read twice in order to meet the Sept. 1 deadline for notifying the state auditor of the new rate.
The new tax levy is an increase of $.0272 over last year.
The measure will raise property taxes on a home appraised at $100,000 (and assessed by $19,000) by $5.17.
In the public hearing on the tax increase, which took place prior to the vote, B. J. Lawrence appealed to aldermen to vote against the increase.
“Why in this economy are you raising taxes?” she said. “You have to stop this. You have to live within your budget like the rest of us have to do.”
Lawrence said Pacific taxpayers are already suffering economically and cannot afford a tax increase.
Mayor Herb Adams countered by saying the city had no choice and had used a formula dictated by Franklin County and the state of Missouri. It’s the same formula that cities follow every year.
“If you don’t like it,” he said, “you have to complain to Franklin County and the state of Missouri.”
If the city officials did anything different, Adams said, they would have to answer to the state auditor.
The mayor told Lawrence she had sent out e-mail messages that were misleading. He did not elaborate.
Adams also urged people in the packed council chamber not to put their trust in either Lawrence or himself, saying they should check with Franklin County for the assessed valuation and with the state auditor’s office for the rules determining the new tax levy.
“I’m telling these people, don’t trust me and don’t trust you,” he said to Lawrence.
Jeannine Stevens, deputy county clerk, said she had confirmed to officials in August that the 2011 city of Pacific assessed valuation was $115,305,726, down from $121,197,065 in 2010.
City Attorney Dan Vogel said the formula that sets the tax levy is designed to create neutral taxation, with no increase and no decrease.
“It’s meant to balance out,” Vogel said. “Assessed valuation in the city is down he said so no one would pay higher taxes.”
Lawrence said the claim that assessed valuation of individual homes would decrease is not believable.
“I’ll bet the assessed valuation on my house didn’t go down,” she said. “I’ll bet that not one person in this room will see the assessed valuation of their homes go down.”
Wayne Overkamp, Franklin county deputy assessor, said some residential homes might have been appraised lower in 2011.
Using this reporter’s home as an example, Overkamp said the appraised value was decreased by $5,000 in 2011. This would result in a decrease in assessed valuation of $950.
“But you could still get a higher tax bill,” he said.
The formula used by cities to set the tax levy dictates the highest amount the city can raise taxes without going to a vote of the taxpayers, the attorney said.
When pressed, Vogel said the formula does not dictate the lowest tax rate officials can enact.
“You could go lower,” he said. “You could choose to have no taxes.”
Lawrence said the biggest factor in setting the new tax levy is the $200,000 the city needs to repay the bonds on the city hall expansion project.
“You’re doing this so you can put your name on a new city hall,” Lawrence told the mayor. “When you put the city hall expansion in the budget it raised the tax rate by that exact amount.”
Both Adams and Vogel stressed that the budget had nothing to do with the tax rate. That claim appears to go against state law.
Eric Reichert, Villa Ridge, asked to speak and when he was recognized he read a portion of the legal notice the city ran announcing that the tax levy public hearing would be held during this meeting.
“The legal notice said the levy was set at what the budget shows to be required beginning July 1, 2011,” Reichert said.
Vogel insisted that the budget did not have anything to do with the tax levy.
“I’m reading this right out of your legal notice,” Reichert said.
“That’s the language that we put in the paper every year,” Alderman Ed Gass said.
Missouri revised Statute RSMO 67.110 chapter states that budget officer shall present to the governing body the assessed valuation of property for the year in which the tax is to be levied, and that of the previous year, and the amount of revenue required to be provided from the property tax as set forth in the annual budget adopted.
Chapter 2 says in more simple terms the tax rates shall be calculated to produce the same revenues as required in the adopted annual budget.
Officials insisted that they followed county and state laws in setting the new levy. Property owners will see the new rates on their 2011 property tax bills.
/* */