By By BETTY MITCHELL GRAY
Staff Writer
When Beaufort County taxpayers open their Christmas presents and celebrate the start of a new year, they can glimpse what the taxman has in store for them in 2010 thanks to a session on tax issues that will be taped tonight for broadcast to the public.
As part of a “final push to educate the public” about the property-tax revaluation that is drawing to a close in Beaufort County, municipal and county leaders have been invited to attend a question-and-answer session led by County Manager Paul Spruill and area property appraisers at the county’s administrative offices, 121 W. Third St. in Washington.
The meeting, which is open to the public and begins at 6 p.m., will be broadcast to the public on area cable-television services during the Christmas and New Year’s holidays.
“The county, in the last year, has made a very deliberate effort to educate our citizens about the nature of this particular eight-year revaluation cycle,” said Spruill. “Tuesday’s meeting is designed as yet another educational tool about what I predict is an average property tax increase of 10 to 12 percent in 2010.”
As part of this effort to educate the public, Spruill, Tax Assessor Bobby Parker and property appraisers have in the last year made presentations similar to the one taking place today to “anyone who would listen,” including some 15 civic and community groups, Spruill said.
State law requires that property be appraised for taxation at 100 percent of its fair market value at least once every eight years.
Beaufort County’s revaluation comes during an economic downturn.
Despite that fact, most homes and land in Beaufort County will increase in value over that recorded in 2002 when property was last revalued, said county tax officials.
Revaluations in neighboring counties have also seen increases in property tax values of between 15 and 43 percent. Of five neighboring counties — Edgecombe, Hyde, Lenoir, Martin and Nash — that completed their property revaluations in the last year, Lenoir County saw the smallest average increase in property values of the five counties — about 15 percent — while Hyde County saw the largest average increase — about 43 percent.
The combination of a tough economy and rising property values leaves county officials nervous that many taxpayers will experience sticker shock when they receive their new property-tax notices later this year and subsequent tax notices in 2010.
“I continue to worry that the timing of Beaufort County’s revaluation has unfortunately occurred in the middle of the toughest economic conditions that the county has seen in at least a generation,” Spruill said.
The good news for Beaufort County property owners is that, although their property values will increase, their property-tax rate will likely fall — in line with the county’s pledge to keep the tax rate revenue neutral after revaluation.
With a similar goal of a “revenue neutral” tax structure,” Hyde County’s tax rate fell by 11.5 cents per $100 of value following that county’s revaluation as a result of the dramatic increase in property values. Lenoir County’s tax rate fell 4 cents per $100 of value following its revaluation.
County taxpayers will receive their new valuation forms — known as Real Estate Assessed Value for 2010 — in early to mid-February, about a month later than in previous revaluation years, Parker said.
The recent economic downturn has slowed Beaufort County’s real-estate sales, which are used by appraisers to value property. To give appraisers as much information as possible, they will evaluate sales up until the last day of the year before determining the updated values of property, Parker said.
That move has delayed the mailing of the new property-valuation forms.
“We want all the sales we can get,” Parker said. “But we have been fortunate in that there have been sales on all kinds of property — from high-end hoses to low-end houses.”