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New Orleans property tax bills expected to drop slightly next year
Source:
nola.com
- Dec 21, 2011
New Orleans property owners whose homes were not reassessed this year can expect a small decrease in the property tax bills that will arrive in January, although the exact size of the cut is still uncertain. All of the agencies that receive property tax revenue in the city have set their 2012 tax rates except for the City Council, which will do so Dec. 1st.
So far, all of the agencies except the Orleans Parish School Board have opted to keep their rates the same as this year, rather than reducing them to offset an increase in the total assessed value of property in the city.
Mayor Mitch Landrieu has asked the council to keep the city's 2011 millage rate in place next year, and while some council members initially seemed cool to the idea, they might have warmed to it.
Councilwoman Stacy Head, thought to be one of the members most likely to favor letting the city's tax rate fall, said this week that she and other council members have been struck by the small number of emails and other messages from the public about the proposed 2012 budget, including the possibility of a "roll forward" to the 2011 millage rate.
Head said that apparent lack of concern increases the likelihood the council will decide on the higher rate, which could mean about $4 million for the city's 2012 budget.
Assuming the council goes along with the mayor's millage request, then, homeowners can expect to see very small reductions in their tax bills next year, thanks to the School Board's action. For instance, the owner of a house appraised at $200,000 would see a drop of $21.35 on his tax bill; the owner of a $300,000 house would pay about $38.43 less than this year.
If the council decides not to roll forward the city's millage, homeowners' savings would likely be about double those amounts.
By law, when total assessments rise, most agencies that receive money from property taxes must vote to reduce their tax rate so that they will not derive any extra money from the higher assessments. However, the taxing body then can decide to restore, or "roll forward," the previous level, producing extra revenue.
This year's citywide tax rate was 147.58 mills on the east bank. Because the west bank levee protection agency levied a slightly higher tax than its east bank counterpart, Algiers property owners paid about 1 mill more.
Because the School Board has decided not to take advantage of the higher assessments by rolling forward, its tax rate will drop by about 1.7 mills. So, if the council does roll the city's millage forward, the new total millage for the east bank will be about 145.87.
If the council opts not to roll forward, the city's tax rate could drop by perhaps another 1.5 mills.
The final amounts are still subject to change based on the results of appeals of assessments filed by numerous property owners.
The total assessed value of property in New Orleans rose by several percentage points after the city's new single assessor, Erroll Williams, re-examined 99,500 of the 166,000 properties citywide and changed the assessments of 81,575 of them. Of those that were changed, about three-quarters were increased, while the other one-quarter got reductions.
The property owners who saw increases in their assessments -- more than a third of the property owners in the city -- will see higher tax bills next year unless the increase was extremely small.
One city agency, the Board of Liquidation, City Debt, is not required to "roll back" or "roll forward" its millage rate. It simply figures out how much money it will need to cover the debt service on the city's bonded indebtedness next year and sets its rate accordingly.
However, even though the total assessments have increased by 6.8 percent, meaning that 1 mill of tax will bring in more money next year, the board decided to keep its tax rate at 25.5 mills, the same as this year.
David Gernhauser, the board's secretary, said he expects that successful appeals will significantly reduce the size of the overall assessments increase. In addition, he said, the board could have larger administrative expenses in 2012, principally a post-Katrina loan it might be required to repay. If the board ends up collecting more money next year than it needs, he said, it will apply the amount to its 2013 expenses, meaning it could set a lower millage rate for that year.
Category: Louisiana
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