Decatur Looks To Provide Tax Relief
Decatur Metro | August 17, 2009So, we all know the state of Georgia has no money, right?
And thanks to new House Bill 143, when the state has no money, it no longer has to pay local governments to fund the Homeowner’s Tax Relief Grant. How convenient! So guess what? Come on, just take a guess…
You got it! Say good-bye to that substantial HTRG reduction on your property tax bill!
However, unlike many metro governments that are just hoping to avoid total financial anarchy, Decatur’s reserve fund seems to be helping the city keep a clear head. And instead of trying to figure out how much they’ll need to raise taxes during a recession, the Decatur city commission is talking about tax relief at tonight’s commission meeting.
According to a note (pages 25 to 27) from Asst. City Manager Andrea Arnold included with tonight’s city commission agenda, the commission recently asked city staff for options that can provide quick tax relief to residents, since the HTRG reduction won’t be on the second installment of our 2009 bill. Arnold has come back to the commission this week with the determination that there is currently only one option available to provide immediate relief on the second installment of the 2009 tax bill.
This is the GS1 or low-income senior exemption that is available to resident homeowners that are 62 years of age or older and the household income does no exceed $25,000. Currently eligible homeowners receive an exemption of $30,000 for City taxes and an exemption of $50,000 for school taxes. The City Commission has the legal authority to increase this exemption up to $50,000. Once the exemption is increased, it cannot be decreased.
Arnold recommends increasing the exemption to the full $50,000 for city taxes, which will reduce revenue available to the City by about $100,000.
Longer term Arnold notes that in future years if the commission wishes to increase the city’s homestead exemption they would need to go before the General Assembly and then face a voter referendum. This means that the earliest an increased exemption could make it through all the red tape and onto your tax bill would be April 2011. She also suggests the possibility of “creating a new homestead exemption through the General Assembly that would provide a temporary (i.e., one year) exemption if the household income drops below a certain threshold.”
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DM: “…thanks to new House Bill 143, when the state has no money, it no longer has to pay back the money it collected from local governments to fund the Homeowner’s Tax Relief Grant.”
This is not the way I understand it works (or did work).
It was actually a “pass-through.” Decatur gave the exemption to its citizens who qualified. It then added up the total it gave and sent the bill to the State. The State then reimbursed the city for the total amount.
But, in a broader sense, the State was simply giving some of us Georgia citizens some of the money we paid in state taxes back.
As a libertarian, I’m pleased in principle to see it go. I’d rather we pay less taxes to the state and more to the city, and let the city give an exemption directly if that’s what the citizenry wants. There’s a lot of waste and corruption involved when we send tax $ to the state and federal government, some of which is send back to the states, local governments, and individuals.
But, that said, I’ll miss the $252 or so.
Thanks Dave, I must have confused HTRG with something else. Now that I read it, your explanation sounds correct. I now remember all the cities being pissed that the state had allowed the first round of exemptions but then refused to pay. I’ll restate above.