Spike in valuations fuels homeowner anger

Arizona Tax Revolt commentary:

It looks like the Editors at the Tucson Citizen have chopped our message down to just a few sound bites. Isn’t it amazing that perhaps the most important issue that will be on the ballot this November is all but being ignored by the press. Ask yourself why this is the case, and why they refused to print our WEB site address for their readers to learn more and get involved.

Our message is, the property taxation system is rigged to provide whatever revenue the bureaucracy and our representatives that have been assimilated into dutiful minions of that bureaucracy desire. Too many of our representatives have forgotten that their first responsibility is to the citizen/taxpayers and they must show this by responsibly setting policy and limiting budgets. If these elected officials had not so totally failed year after year to perform their oversight functions and fiduciary responsibility to the taxpayers there would be no need for a Tax Revolt. They have brought this onto themselves!

The Arizona schools and the press have absolutely no basis to claim that the K-12 school funding would be adversely affected by our property tax rollback, as the Arizona Tax Revolt measures in conformance with Arizona Law will NOT reduce revenue to the public schools. They are due to the voter approved Prop 301, passed in 2000 immune from revenue cuts.

Marc Goldstone, Chair.
Arizona Tax Revolt

Published: March 28, 2008
Tucson Citizen

By, Gary Duffy

Rapidly rising property valuations in recent years and the taxes they lead to have some homeowners fighting mad.

Many homeowners have seen valuations on which property tax bills are calculated double in the past few years - based on a soaring housing market that has since crashed and burned.

"My house has gone up over 100 percent in the past five years," Steve Koch said recently of the house south of Grant Road and west of Silverbell Road that he built and that his family still lives in.

Marcia Lincoln said the valuation on her property on the West Side hit the stratosphere last year with a full-cash-value increase of 147 percent from the previous year.

That's for a 1,220-square foot home on 13 rural acres.

"I'm in a neighborhood that was built in the 1950s," she said.

Both Koch and Lincoln in years past have filed appeals of their property valuations with the Pima County Assessor's Office - with mixed success. Koch said he always appeals valuations for both his residence and commercial properties. He hires property tax experts to argue his cases and occasionally succeeds.

"Of the million people here in the county, probably 10 can tell you how the tax system works," Koch said.

Lincoln said she appealed her valuation for last calendar year and succeeded in getting some relief.

More than 7,500 homeowners appealed their valuations in 2007.

On Saturday, the Pima Association of Taxpayers, a nonprofit property tax watchdog organization, will hold a free meeting to help homeowners interested in appealing.

The appeal deadline is April 28.

Koch and Lincoln have taken the additional step of becoming volunteers with Arizona Tax Revolt, whose members are circulating petitions to get two property-tax initiatives on the November ballot.

One would roll back home valuations to 2003 levels. The other would force taxing jurisdictions to use an average of tax levies collected over the past four years to set tax rates in 2009.

Valuations began rising rapidly in 2003, reflecting the housing market bubble and resulting in higher property taxes.

Pima County Assessor Bill Staples says that valuations sent recently to homeowners have flattened out and, in some cases, have dropped because of the slumping real estate market.

Valuations are partly based on the market prices of nearby, similar homes. Homeowners living in neighborhoods with a high turnover during the hot market likely saw their values increase significantly.

Owners of homes in the higher end of the market - $750,000 and above - likely have not seen a flattening in valuations because that market has not dipped appreciably, Staples said.

Valuations mailed to homeowners last month won't apply to property tax bills that will be sent out in September.

Arizona law mandates a one-year to 18-month lag from when valuations are set and when they are calculated into property tax bills. The recent valuations will begin to be applied in the 2009-10 fiscal year.

That allows taxpayers time to gather information about their properties and comparable ones nearby so they can formulate an appeal.

This year, homeowners will still be stuck with valuations - and property tax bills that follow in September - that rose with rising home prices over the past few years.

The recent rapid climb in home valuations has allowed Pima County supervisors to trim property tax rates.

But dramatically higher valuations offset that - and more.

"Valuation increases more often than not result in property tax increases," Mark Goldstone, executive director of Arizona Tax Revolt, said this week.

Goldstone said the effort aimed at getting the two initiatives on the November ballot was inspired by the approval of Proposition 13 by California voters in 1978.

That measure reduced property taxes - but at the expense of school districts and government services that relied on tax revenue, critics said.

Government officials may tell homeowners they make efforts to keep property taxes down, but their end goal is to fund government, Goldstone said.

"Valuation increases increase government revenues. Our governments have set up the property tax systems to benefit governments - not property owners," Goldstone said.

"A lot of people don't understand the process," said Mary Schuh, a perennial critic of the county's property taxation and budget process, and a member of the group organizing Saturday's meeting on appeals..

"We do this to take the mystique out of the appeal process."