AUBURN – Auburn tax assessors should begin bringing the city’s business tax books up to date as they wrap up work on real estate tax revaluations.
Assessors will begin canvassing the city in February, counting new businesses.
They should send out inventory forms for personal property taxes then and should begin calculating what local businesses owe.
The inventories are due back to the city assessor in April.
“We have no idea just how much revenue we’ll pick up until they start filing those notices,” City Assessor Cheryl Dubois said.
Dubois said the city is nearly finished with informal hearings concerning new real estate property values.
The city mailed new values to property owners in November that showed tax bills doubling or tripling.
Dubois said her staff has met with about 600 property owners since November to talk about their property values.
“But we still have a few still trickling in,” Dubois said. “We won’t really get started on personal property until we’re a little farther along on the real estate taxes.”
This will be the second year the city has calculated business taxes according to a new depreciation schedule that brings in more revenue on older items.
The city requires businesses to provide inventories of all of business properties for personal property taxes annually.
Items that are new this year are taxed on 95 percent of their value.
The taxable value of older items drops, or depreciates, over time.
Dubois slowed that rate of depreciation last spring, increasing the taxes on older items.
The old schedule depreciated the value of personal property by about 10 percent per year for eight years; anything older than that was taxed at 20 percent.
The new schedule depreciates values at 5 percent per year for 14 years.
Anything older than that is taxed at 30 percent of its original value.
The city also charges personal property taxes on computer equipment, but Dubois said that schedule didn’t change. Computers lose value more quickly, depreciating about 14 percent per year for five years.
Business owners paid their first round of taxes based on the new schedule in September.
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