Assessor explains property tax increases

The year of property reassessments has finally come to an end after nearly seven months spent reassessing every property in Evangeline Parish that falls under the parish’s tax assessor’s duty.
On Thursday, EP Tax Assessor Dirk Deville said, “We began assessing properties around February, and we just assessed the last few properties we had today.”
The task, which is required of the tax assessor’s office every four years, had many residents in the parish experiencing an increase in the amount that they were previously required to pay for property taxes. According to Deville though, there is an explanation for that.
In previous years the tax assessor said without a large staff, he and his office were unable to reassess every single property in the parish in one year, but after nearly failing the state’s ratio study that is done on the assessor, Deville and his team made a conscious effort to hit every property in the parish for reassessing.
Deville said, “We have never failed a ratio study, however last year we barely passed, and the tax commission employee charged with reviewing our parish at that time suggested that our values in the rural areas were lagging behind, so this year we made a special effort and in fact did look at every single property in the parish, and did our best to value the properties correctly.”
Deville and his team, which consist of: Josh Fontenot, Cody Jones, and Joe Maggio; were able to successfully reassess all properties not because their team is any larger, but because they were able to use modern technology such as Google Earth.
When determining the amount of property taxes property owners must pay, the tax assessor’s office first must determine the value of the home.
This is done by comparing what houses are selling for in that particular area, the age of a home, the style of a home, and the square footage of the home. The style of home is determined by which category a home fits into. Category one would be a total brick home on a slab, category two would be a composite home or part wood and part brick home on a slab, and category three would be a wood frame house on blocks. Google Earth was used to determine the square footage of some homes.
Once a home’s value is determined, the millage in a certain area is used to calculate what a home owner owes for property taxes.
For example, if your property and home is valued at $165,000.00 you would subtract $75,000.00 from the value for homestead exemption, which every Louisiana resident receives. The home owner in this scenario would be left paying taxes on $90,000.00. If the millage in an area is 1.5 than for every thousand dollars the tax payer would have to pay $1.50. To determine the total property taxes to be paid in this scenario if the millage is 1.5, you would multiply 90 by 1.5.
According to Deville, “metal buildings and driveways definitely increase the value of a home,” and therefore four years ago if a property owner did not have a metal building or driveway during reassessment then the value of their home may have been less than the value once the driveway or shed was added. If the value goes up, so will the property taxes even if the millage stays the same.
People whose property taxes have increased, have also been asking where all of this money is going, and just like Deville was able to explain why property taxes increased, the tax assessor was also able to shed light on where this money ends up.
Deville said, “Reassessment is not intended to generate additional monies for the government. It is designed to be more revenue neutral. When we figure out what the total increase in our tax base is as a result of reassessment we must submit that information to the Louisiana Legislature Auditors Office. They then dissect the information and calculate what millages each taxing body may adopt for the year. The sheriff then distributes the taxes collected to the different taxing bodies based on their adopted millage.”
According to Deville, because of the property tax increase “some taxing bodies may experience a small gain, but some may experience a loss as well.”
With property taxes going up, the taxing bodies that receive a portion of these taxes will receive more money if their millage remains the same.
Now that all of the assessments are done for another four years, Deville promises that all property assessments were performed properly.
Deville said, “We don’t want people paying more than what they should be. I have a wonderful staff that is very knowledgeable when it comes to assessments, and we have all done our best to do everything required of us correctly.”