Revenue & Tax - Senate

Twenty four yeah. Okay members We'll call this meeting to order Uh we welcome everybody Revenue and Tax Committee the first we the first item on our agenda is SP one eighty four we have a small amendment though just on a word that we call a sitting here so there's a amendment on that one coming over so we're going to take up S. B. one eighty five at this time Senator Johnson. If you would please go to the end of the table and. Introduce yourself and your and you're recognized to start when you when you need to. Thank you member Senator Blake Johnson this is a clean up from our tax appeals commission. The the procedure for appointment there is this supreme court and this bill gives ultimate authority for those appointments with the governor and this is just proving of for a. During the process for the future. Okay soon Johnson's presented his bill to any of the members have any questions in regards to it. Three one signed up to speak for against the bill. Okay anyone already is one speak for. Against this bill. Okay here in hearing none was pleasure of the Committee. I have a motion do pass. Not yet that's the next one. We have a motion do pass by Senator Payton is that correct center plating Center crows a second all in favor say aye aye aye any oppose. Graduation Senator is passed that the the amendment for that other one I'll be over here shortly right. Okay I believe that the. Senate is mines also own on this list I don't know if he's running another bill in a committee or not we sent him a text to see if he's coming and we're just going to sit here for a moment to that amendment comes in on is B. one eighty four. Thank you senator is mayor went on Amendment on another bills you kinda helped us anyway so this point. It members we have a handout. On this bill. Which is Senate bill one ninety eight. You're recognized introduce yourself and. Again whatever you want to send. Hi Jonathan Dismang I am late Senate bill one ninety eight. I thank you hi this is really just bring some clarity on reassessments going to take it every four years there's an exception you can ask for a waiver of that inside the bill is folks can speak on it better than I can but right now it's just unpredictable you know supported by folks that are in real estate just to kind of bring a little conformity and then also the sisters everybody else that's involved again just just bring a higher level of understanding of when things are going to occur. Whatever you get to the table if you will you can just a recognized if you would introduce yourself and you're recognized. Okay. That my name's Russell hill and I'm Washington as such for Washington County and then also to have a lot of our other assessors here and I'm on the board for the Arkansas sisters Association hi this bill Senate Senate bill one ninety eight is that currently the counties in Arkansas do a re appraisal cycles on a three or five year basis Thank you that there wouldn't be much volatility but with the way that the market's been going this last reappraisal we had seventeen fifteen of seventeen counties that underwent their reappraisal want to a three year cycle what is done is it and is you look at the map you see the yellow all the county state creates a a a a with a very hard job for us to do this on a statewide basis seventy the seventy five counties have contractors to do these re appraisals. And it makes it very hard when they have to juggle this this this that thing moving around you have multiple County switching and it creates an offset state wide it makes it very difficult for the contractors to have the same amount of job to do on a reappraisal but they have two less years to do it so when they switch to a three year cycle it's that they have to hire more people it's takes two years to get your certification to even for them to go out and do some of these things on their own and so it's a it creates at a work issue problem bouncing from county to county and if you look there to we've got a large number twenty five. Almost half the entire state's gonna be undergoing reappraisal at that time and then you go on the twenty seven you only have to counties they're gonna be undergoing reappraisal that time so from just a work flow management it creates a nightmare for our contractors and and the people observing that to go with the state department managing that and it just creates an opportunity for mistakes to be made for property owners it creates a lot of confusion to and for title companies I'm constantly going to really speak to realtors and title companies letting them know when a reappraisal is coming up because I don't know front what cycle we're on and will so when they're representing that the buyer and whenever that reappraisal happens if someone buys a house that property goes to the full value and they get hit with a tax bill they weren't expecting so this helps prepare the people who are representing them as home buyers if they know every four years it just creates okay we know this is coming up we can protect our home buyers with that. Your senate is made to everything else and get into it does bring some certain to to the property owner we're trying out maybe three or maybe five or maybe it was five but we cited to go to three minutes And so that I think that's for the benefit mom involved in the bill. In any of the members you'll have any questions. Senator paid. Thank you Mr so just a couple of questions one. Currently the law is if if you purchase a piece of real estate the purchase price essentially us sets that by you in the in the so well it's what the assessor puts on the value of that property that what happens is we do a re appraisal for example Washington County with our reappraisal in twenty twenty so we set those values and those values will ride for three years running three year cycle right now and then in twenty twenty three we will adjust the values from twenty twenty and then we set a new value according to what the market's doing such okay so property if you stay in your home we have Amendment seventy nine so whenever we adjust those values it's only going up five percent on your primary ten percent on all other property so all we're doing is instead of going to a three year or five year cycle we just we're kind of split in the middle at four and go let's just go on a four year let's keep it at that and that just keeps a continuity with our contractors and the state department that oversees this it creates a tremendous burden on them too I would imagine I don't know I don't work for the state but I would think if you have to counties one year thirty eight counties the next year it creates a management problem from just the amount of work because it is a tremendous amount of work we undergo a reappraisal okay so just have to follow up I I probably didn't ask if my question very clear okay so I guess maybe I'm one of the unlucky ones that when I buy a piece of property the value that I then get to pay tax on is usually my purchase price you're saying that's not always the case. Correct yeah I mean we're yeah that's not that's just a clarification there and then in terms of owner's rights of appeal this is not gonna change anything they still have they don't have to wait every four years they could appeal every year every year okay. Thank you for. I know what's coming yeah it really per because I think really. Property owners out there really don't know. But that it's the title companies and the rulers those are the ones representing a lot of this property and it's when you find seller property they need to know but even for them when we bounce from a three to a five in the lake because forever we were on a five year cycle and then the market still what students an hour on a three and yes when you bounce around like that it creates confusion for them because they're used to doing business every five years and then for example we we had a a family kept that you know that this was a two thousand five we had a value on the House six hundred seventy seven thousand dollars on the sound so their property tax bill seven thousand. in twenty twenty it went to one point one million was the new value and F. family bought it in twenty nineteen so they were they knew the property tax bill was seven thousand the previous year well due to re appraisal the new tax bill was thirteen thousand so their property taxes one of six thousand dollars in one year because of the reappraisal and and they didn't want to do if they're gonna be able stay in our house or not are they you know so what we want to do is we want to make sure that people are informed when they go in on the buying process that get ready make sure you calculate this correctly and they came in they go we're not arguing the value because that's about what they paid for it we're just going what happened with our property tax bill almost doubling you know and so this could help hopefully prepare these title companies and realtors to help prevent people from walking into something like that. Okay synergies you have a question. You Mr just to make sure I'm following the uncertainty that you're trying to prevent on page one line thirty five this is it says counties can assess at a minimum of one time every year that's the current situation is minimum so are we seeing it happen much more than that what would you say is the normalcy. With houses nine what we swear on our either three or five year cycle it's about this would move it to a four year yes just a consistent four so we're not bounce that we're not rotating all counties for all counties individually and I think there's a. a contingency are at a portion of that ACT would have the ability to cycle some of these either at three or five or four what we would do is we want to create an equal amount of counties each year so we can manage that work flow on and on an annual basis and so they would eventually move some counties over to where say you have twenty five twenty five and twenty five you know okay maybe take a year off or something where we're based out to you know nineteen counties each year over that for years so. Senate. Thank you Mr so as we go from the stagger it's currently own to the for your stagger and try to. I ballot is twenty five percent of the counties each year. How many counties are going to be driven into a short time frame on the reappraisal private process no words were saved right now there are two years out. And we're gonna make on for or they're going to be three years out we're gonna make it to right I think the fail to do this I think what we would think with the desire to currently do is finish out your current reappraisal cycle so whatever your site wherever you are in your cycle finish that out and then your next cycle will either be four three four five if you were scheduled to go on a three might be another three to balance it out for you might go to a four or you could go to a five so the way you understand the way the bills written it should not shorten the cycle of any of them now they're currently on okay thank you. Any other questions. Okay we don't have anyone signed up to speak for against the bill is there anyone in the audience wants to speak against it. I assume that there's a lot of you all out there that are for this. All you know we're talking guests will start but. So yes center Dismang you're recognized closed okay of members over the bill is our motion and a motion to pass by Senator Payton I have a second by Senator Petty all in favor say aye opposed here none it is passed. Thank you. Senator Johnson you're going to be recognized for its B. one eighty four and we do have an amendment so I thought I'd ask staff if they would pass out the amendment will look at it first. if you would please enter date is yourself and then you'll be a recognized to present your amendment. Senator Blake Johnson the the amendment the is on page two. It deletes line three and four and It's in received by the tax bills Commission. This gives clarity where the they receive it and uh. And it's been postmark. Okay. We have a motion and a we have a motion by Senator Payton for adoption center crows second all in favor say aye opposed okay the amendment is adopted you're now recognized to present your bill. Members this the this bill is needed because they are receiving the these appeals at this time and this one has the Emergency Clause and is just a matter of of postmark so so the taxpayer covered and this amendment bill they receive it in the first postmarked during nursing and shape on. Okay you committee members have any questions in regards to this. Anyone in the audience will speak against. Anyone will speak for. C. N. onion closer I'm close motion all right. All right so we have a motion from center Johnson to passes B. one eighty four is amended. The second by Senator Payton all in favor say aye opposed Like signs here none the it is passed congradulations is there any other business to come before us. With that returned.