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March 4, 2009

County to appeal Malakoff appraisal

Comptroller’s Office says numbers are too low

By Rich Flowers News Editor

A statewide reported released by the Comptroller’s Office has rated Henderson County’s property appraisals as generally on target, but that doesn’t mean the county agrees with the state’s assessment completely.

The Henderson County Appraisal District plans to appeal the state’s findings concerning one county school district in the State Comptroller’s 2009 Property Tax study, Chief Appraiser Bill Jackson said.

The comptroller’s property tax division conducts the property value study annually to estimate a school district’s taxable property values and to measure the central appraisal district’s performance. Property appraisal role values are divided by their market values, which result in a ratio measuring the CAD’s effectiveness.

“We got a good report overall. Malakoff values were low,” Jackson said. “We are filing an appeal.”

HCAD has until March 11 to submit the appeal.

The state accepted the HCAD calculations for the Athens, Brownsboro, Cross Roads, Eustace, LaPoynor, Murchison and Trinidad school districts. Malakoff’s numbers were said to be invalid, but the school district is currently under a one-year grace period.

During a grace period, the local appraisal role value is accepted even though the study rules the local appraisal role values invalid. To qualify for the grace period, the local assessments must have been ruled acceptable by the state for the previous two-year period.

HCAD assessed Malakoff’s taxable value at $898,112,800 as opposed to $950,677,787 in the state study.

The report states that the primary use of the study is to help equalize school funding. The secondary use of the study is to assess an appraisal district’s performance.

“I don’t have any problem with the property tax values from the state,” Jackson said. “For the most part they’ve done a pretty good job. It’s a pretty good study.”

By statute, the appraisal district must appraise the property at market value. Jackson said his office has a good record of doing that.

“We’ve been fortunate in Henderson County. We have a good staff of people. We have experience here that helps considerably,” he said.

HCAD is currently compiling its 2009 numbers to send out notices in April.

“We haven’t started running numbers yet. The target date is March 15. We usually hit it pretty close,” Jackson said.

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