BETHEL – Stung by criticism that they’ve been lax at collecting taxes prior to a recently completed revaluation, Bethel assessors and Town Manager and Tax Collector Scott Cole agreed Wednesday morning to get more aggressive.

But they waffled for about an hour on whether to eliminate collecting personal property tax, which is a state law, or continue to try to collect the voluntary tax that hasn’t been very collectible.

“State law provides no mechanism to collect it. It’s a farce statewide and legislators ought to act on it,” Cole said after the nearly two-hour meeting.

“Most towns in Maine are ignoring parts of personal property tax by not aggressively assessing. Mill towns will defend their status quo for the obvious reason and other towns treat personal property tax with a casual attitude. Past governors are all in favor of eliminating the personal property tax but, in the end, resistance from mill towns is greater than the rest of the towns,” he said.

During the meeting between selectmen, assessors and revaluation contractor and contracted assessors’ agent William Van Tuinen of Madison, Cole said, “Current policy is rewarding the scofflaw, the people that ignore making a declaration. The entire personal property tax is based on what you stumble over. We owe it to people playing by the rules to go after those who aren’t.”

Responding to a list of questions from residents that Cole put to assessors and their agent, Van Tuinen said that as of April 1 personal property generally employed in business is taxable.

But assessor and Selectman Robert Everett said some businesses reply to questions about personal property, some don’t, and others don’t understand they must.

“There’s a lot of inequity as far as who pays and who doesn’t,” he said. “Other than hiring an extra person, you almost have to have a person dedicated to resolving yearly issues. Perhaps we should do away with it in Bethel.”

That’s when Van Tuinen reminded them that it’s state law.

“It’s OK to ignore property of less than $1,000, but exempting accounts of less than $1 million flies in the face of taxing properly,” Van Tuinen said.

When discussion turned to taxing lawn mower tractors valued at more than $1,000, assessor John Head said, “Let’s leave the lawn mowers alone.”

“Aren’t we already ignoring the law by not going after lawn mowers? We’re already ignoring the law,” assessor Robert Blake answered.

“So we are skirting the law by not taxing lawn tractors valued at $1,500?” Everett asked.

“Correct. But that’s been your policy forever,” Van Tuinen said. He later recommended that town officials contact their legislative representatives to try and change the state law so that it doesn’t apply to Bethel.

In the end, they pushed a decision off to the assessor’s meeting at 8 a.m. Wednesday, Sept. 19, when the tax rate is expected to be established.