Current Use Advisory Board to update decades-old formulas as agricultural use values rise

The Current Use Advisory Board set the annual use values this week and is preparing a formal update of administrative rules that govern Vermont’s current use property-tax program, Jill Grama, director of property valuation and review at the Department of Taxes and chair of the advisory board, told legislators.

The advisory board’s work matters to landowners because the “use values” replace fair-market value on enrolled property for tax purposes; as the figure used to calculate exemptions rises, enrolled landowners’ tax savings shrink. Grama said the agriculture use value has climbed notably in recent years because its formula relies on a rental-rate factor that has trended upward.

Grama described the board as “a statutory construct” with membership and duties prescribed by law. She said the board’s main duties are establishing use values each year, holding required public hearings and overseeing the administrative rules for the current use program, which have not been updated since 1985. “We are actively working on updating those,” she said, and the board is preparing…