The Georgia House and Senate are battling it out this session over who can pass the more meaningful tax relief as homeowners complain about their property assessments exploding in recent years.
In the past few days the House Ways and Means Committee and Senate Finance Committee have pushed several bills aimed at helping tamp down property tax increases.
The Senate earlier this session passed Senate Bill 349, a measure to cap how much home assessments can go up each year at 3%. The Senate Finance Committee has since twice inserted it into House bills in hopes of getting the measure moving in that chamber.
And on Tuesday, the panel altered House Speaker Jon Burns’ proposal to hike the homestead exemption from $2,000 to $4,000, amending House Bill 1019 to make the new exemption $10,000.
“I love to give more people more tax relief because they deserve to keep more of their own money,” said Sen. John Albers, R-Roswell, vice chairman of the Finance Committee and the sponsor of the amendment.
Meanwhile, the Ways and Means Committee debated a Christmas tree of a property tax bill — a measure with lots of ideas attached like ornaments — but it couldn’t reach a consensus after a key provision was nixed that would essentially freeze assessments at the sale price of a home.
“You are looking at some historic property tax relief,” said House Ways and Means Chairman Shaw Blackmon, R-Bonaire.
Earlier in the session, the House too had passed several property tax bills that haven’t moved in the Senate.
The bills aim to respond to homeowners who, in some areas, have said they are being taxed off their property as assessments have skyrocketed with the booming housing market.
A homeowner’s property tax bill is mostly made up of two elements: the tax rate and the assessed value of the property. School districts, cities and counties have been able to count on a boost in revenue without raising tax rates because the assessed values of homes and businesses in some areas have risen sharply.
Senators say about 75% of what homeowners pay goes to schools, and local governments have been taking in double-digit increases in revenue without raising the tax rate.
The Senate’s 3% cap on unimproved property assessment increases could mean local governments and schools would have to raise tax rates, but some lawmakers say at least that would make the process more transparent to homeowners, many of whom don’t understand the values placed on their homes.
Burns has touted doubling the statewide homestead exemption since January. His bill passed the House unanimously in February. By lowering the taxable value of a homeowner’s property, such exemptions cut his or her tax bill.
Senate leaders said it didn’t go far enough. The $2,000 exemption was approved in the 1970s, according to the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Matt Reeves, R-Duluth, when homes on average cost $55,000.
But Reeves last week said the change in Burns’ bill would only affect taxpayers in a third of Georgia counties because most already have homestead exemptions that are higher than the standard state exemption. And even in counties with a $2,000 exemption now, taxpayers would save a minimal amount, senators said.
Because it was a relatively last-minute change — the General Assembly session ends next week — there was no fiscal report on how much the increase to $10,000 would cost local governments and school boards. Lawmakers are supposed to have those reports available when they vote on tax bills so they know how much they cost. But they often don’t at the end of the session, when almost every measure is rewritten or entirely gutted and replaced with new provisions.
There is nothing sponsors of legislation can do when their bill is rewritten in a committee, other than rewrite it again later on. Reeves accepted the Senate Finance Committee’s decision and relayed a message to the panel’s members from his boss, Burns.
“I’ve been given the word, do the work of the Senate, we did the work in the House,” he said. “Whatever number you think is appropriate, we’ll take a close look at it.”
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