Politics & Government

County Commissioners Override Reassessment Veto

Lehigh County will proceed with its new tax values for residential and business properties after commissioners override Don Cunningham veto.

Emmaus Patch residents, check your mailboxes.

Letters should be arriving soon from Lehigh County, with information about the new assessments on your property. Residents can appeal if they do not agree with the new number.

Lehigh County commissioners voted 8-1 on Wednesday night to override county Executive Don Cunningham's veto of a bill to assign new tax values to residential and business properties throughout the county, according to alehighvalleylive.com report.

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The veto override now paves the way for the countywide reassessment, which has not been done since 1991. Reassessments are "revenue neutral," with some people paying more taxes and some paying less in a redistribution of who pays what in property taxes to schools and county and local governments.

Patch  that the county was beginning the process of reassessing all properties to get a more accurate value for tax purposes. Since then, however, the county administration looked to delay the reassessment because of the depressed real estate market.

Find out what's happening in Emmauswith free, real-time updates from Patch.

 Cunningham said he vetoed the bill for the reassessment because "it is the wrong thing to do at the wrong time, and it will have grave and lasting consequences for our county and our property owners."

Since reassessments give a value to every property in the county at a snapshot in time, he said, "Those numbers should not be set in a depressed price market."

The administration hoped to delay the reassessment until the real estate market stabilized.

"In these economic times, a significantly higher property tax on business owners could hinder some hiring; an increase on apartment building owners is likely to be passed on to renters; and, higher costs for farmland could result in farmers deciding to sell off property instead of keeping it for open space or to farm," Cunningham said in his statement. "And, of course, a dramatic increase for a homeowner on a fixed income could lead to selling."

The veto override was expected.

Commissioner Scott Ott said at the commissioner meeting on Wednesday that the county can't wait for market conditions to improve or for state reform before moving on the reassessment, according to a report in The Morning Call.

Commissioner Vic Mazziotti said the reassessment will redistribute the tax payments more equitably, according to the lehighvalleylive.com report.

 


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