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Griggs County tax director urges countywide reassessment of commercial elevators; commission approves equalization agreement
Summary
Tax director Linda Morris told commissioners the county must update elevator valuations and other property data to comply with state requirements; the board approved a tax director equalization contract and discussed hiring outside appraisers for large commercial elevators.
Linda Morris, Griggs County tax director, told the County Commission on Oct. 6 that the State Board of Equalization extended the county's reassessment deadline to February 2027 and that the county needs to update several commercial property valuations.
Morris said she has received “several phone calls from the elevators within Griggs County, asking for reassessments on them,” and asked the commission to consider hiring an outside appraiser to reassess commercial grain elevators countywide. She estimated the cost at roughly $4,000–$5,000 per elevator based on past engagements and said Crown Appraisals of Fargo had been used previously.
The reassessment request follows Morris’s review of prior work; she said some elevator valuations date to 2018 and included additional years of depreciation that have not been updated. Morris described a gap between the county’s tax program and the soils/acreage database that has left parcel-level values out of sync and said she is working to reconcile the records.
Morris also told the commission that state requirements are changing: counties must assign values to properties that are currently exempt (for example, churches, schools, county and city buildings and cemeteries) and submit those values to the state by March. “We need to come up with a value, and we need to submit those values to the state,” she said. She said the office plans to send exemption forms to farm residents and review farm-resident exemptions as required by state statute.
Morris cautioned the commission that reassessing exempt farm properties could become politically sensitive at the legislative level and recommended conservative valuations where appropriate to avoid undue impacts on small farmers. She also recommended valuing large commercial elevators individually rather than applying blanket increases that can skew comparisons between properties.
After discussion, the commission approved a tax director equalization agreement submitted by Morris. Commissioner Edlund moved to accept the agreement and a second was recorded; the motion was adopted by voice vote and carried.
The county will continue the technical work Morris described—reconciling the soils and tax databases, sending exemption reapplication forms, and assessing commercial elevator values—and she said she will return with cost estimates and contract terms if outside appraisal work is pursued.
