Commissioners:

Judging from what may be incomplete comments to WBTV, there seems to be great confusion about the property tax revaluation issue now before you. Simply put, there are two distinct matters which require your attention. One, is the very real probability that Mecklenburg County is revaluing at the height of a boom-bust cycle, and two, that a higher reval will result in higher property tax bills for many county taxpayers.

There is only one thing which can address both issues, and that is a vote by the commission to lower the property tax rate to a revenue-neutral number. Delaying the reval does nothing to normalize county tax rates.

As for Commissioner Ramirez’s concerns that “taxes will be higher because of the boom of the last five year,” only a rate reduction will address this concern. A reval after six years will still result in higher valuations than 2003 for the vast majority of county taxpayers, and hence higher tax bills. Some of the phantom value may be squeezed out in 12 months, but taxpayers will still be hit with higher tax bills unless the commission votes to reduce the tax rate.

This brings us to Commissioner Roberts unsubstantiated assertion that some county property has declined in value since 2003. This would be an extremely rare situation anywhere in the county and is certainly not representative of the situation facing most property owners. While it might be true that many values have declined since the peaks of 2005 or 2006, going all the way back to 2003 you would be fortunate to find even 10 percent of property in the county with a lower valuation. Whatever the exact percentage, it is bad public policy to make decisions based on the exceptions rather than the rule.

I also want to point out that delaying the revalue process would have the perverse effect of continuing to allow partial teardowns in some close-in suburbs to continue to carry a much too-low valuation as compared to the property’s market value. Property records show that Dilworth, for example, is choked with rebuilt homes that have sold for many hundreds of thousands of dollars above their 2003 valuations. A reval now corrects this imbalance and insures that all taxpayers pay tax on an accurate value to the extent possible.

And that should be the county’s goal. First, accurate valuations and second, stable property tax bills. Market forces have put the former in question, but the second is wholly within the commission’s power to control. For that reason your energies would be best directed toward coming up with a revenue-neutral — ie lower — property tax rate that would hold taxpayers as a whole harmless from the phantom values the commission did not create and cannot control. Staying on the five-year cycle would ensure these values would self-correct by 2013.

Thanks for your time and your service to our community.

Jeff A. Taylor
Charlotte, NC