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Allen County officials want to be able to decide how to distribute property tax relief the state would provide to homeowners this year.
During a joint meeting Wednesday morning, the County Council and county commissioners discussed the options available this year to help local homeowners. County officials are also leaning toward providing relief to all owner-occupied homes and not just those in areas hardest hit by recent tax increases, such as Aboite Township residents.
The General Assembly approved $300 million in relief this year to be doled out at the end of the year or early 2008 to all Hoosiers living in owner-occupied homesteads through a rebate or refund. State officials have suggested targeting the relief to homes in communities seeing the largest tax increases.
Statewide, homeowners are seeing property taxes go up about 24 percent. Locally, the average tax increase is 12 percent, although new Fort Wayne residents living in Aboite Township saw average tax bill increases of 57 percent this summer.
Gov. Mitch Daniels has suggested a circuit-breaker approach to doling out the $300 million. That approach would benefit home owners with high-value homes.
Beth Garber, the county’s lobbyist, told county officials that the governor’s plan could give the bulk of Allen County’s property tax relief portion to Aboite Township residents and likely no one else.
The relief going to Aboite homeowners might also be less than if the money was spread out evenly throughout the county, said Chris Cloud, a commissioner’s office staffer.
The expected average credit homeowners will receive is about $240.
Councilman Darren Vogt, R-3rd, said the decision how to distribute the money should be left to local officials.
He also said that the increase in city taxes that caused the bulk of the hike for Aboite homeowners should be excluded when evaluating how much relief those homeowners should receive. The higher property taxes there had little to do with changes in property assessments, which have caused problems in other counties, Vogt said.
Also, giving any extra hand to Aboite homeowners would be unfair to homeowners in the Pine Valley and Arlington-Cherry Hill areas that the city also annexed in recent years, Commissioner Nelson Peters said.
The two groups of elected officials plan to meet again this month to discuss changes the county would like see made to state laws governing property taxes.
The commissioners have asked the Fort Wayne City Council to wait a year before implementing any changes in the local income tax in an effort to reduce the local dependence on property taxes.
Council President Paul Moss, R-at large, suggested the state should change the makeup of the board that determines how much local income taxes are collected. In Allen County, the Fort Wayne City Council has that task, leaving County Council members, who also represent city residents, without much say.
Also, county officials would like the General Assembly to tweak the options for shifting more of the local tax burden away from property taxes.
“Most scenarios indicate that working homeowners in most of the cases lost out on the alternatives provided at this point,” Peters said. “We need to find a situation where the majority actually benefit.”
aiacone@jg.net
