Legislation that would have exempted the Androscoggin Valley Council of Governments from property taxes will be carried over until next year.

Until then, Auburn will be forced to continue its strange tax dance with AVCOG.

AVCOG has never paid property taxes in Auburn, where it owns a 10,000-square-foot building on Manley Road. Until 1997, the quasi-governmental agency wasn’t even assessed taxes. After that, the city waived the tax bill. In 2003, Councilor Bob Mennealy questioned the practice, and the city’s lawyers agreed that AVCOG should pay.

Since then, the city has backed various AVCOG efforts to avoid paying its tax bill, $36,025.76 in real estate taxes and $14,690 in personal property taxes.

L.D. 1230, in addition to making organizations like AVCOG tax-exempt, also included several other troubling provisions that would could shift significant authority from municipal governments to unelected regional authorities. For now, we don’t have to worry about that.

The city, however, doesn’t have an option to wait any longer. The Legislature doesn’t seem likely to bail it out this year by letting AVCOG off the hook. City leaders must decide if they’re going to collect the owed taxes or continue to shift that burden onto Auburn taxpayers.