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Believe it for not, there was a time when Hoosiers could expect to receive their property tax bills each April. Half the bill was due in May, the other half in November.
Most years, property owners could expect a modest increase. And they knew that every five years, their properties would be reassessed, which could cause a bigger change in their bills.
But a generation of Hoosier homeowners has never known such stability.
In the decade since the Indiana Supreme Court rightly threw out the state’s property assessment system, getting and paying property tax bills has been anything but routine.
The first reassessment after the court ruling was late. Since then, changes in property tax laws and assessment procedures have produced wild fluctuations in tax bill dates and amounts nearly every year. Indeed, though the General Assembly “fixed” property taxes a year ago, only a handful of Indiana counties have mailed out tax bills this year – even though they were due in April.
Residents of most Indiana counties are still waiting for their bills – Allen County property owners may get theirs in late July, 3 1/2 months late.
With local officials struggling to complete the work to get out the 2009 bills – and to get going on 2010 bills so they are not late – they are also legally obligated to begin another complete property reassessment July 1 for the bills that will go out in 2012.
Those 2009 and 2010 bills must account for the complex and still-unknown effects of property tax caps. As the caps get lower, they will have more effect on the bills. Enough already.
A common-sense proposal to give all assessment officials a chance to catch up almost made it through this past session of the General Assembly but was tripped up by language technicalities. Lawmakers should adopt the proposed one-year delay in reassessment as part of the budget bill they need to pass in special session by June 30 to avert a state government shutdown.
Though the budget bill may well be the only piece of legislation lawmakers consider during the special session, the one-year delay directly affects all local government budgets and is appropriate for inclusion in the budget legislation.
