Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Tax Policy topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Beaufort County staff outline revenue-neutral tax math as commissioner accuses them of raising taxes
Summary
County manager and finance staff walked the board through the state-required revenue-neutral calculation and the Local Government Commission template; Commissioner Richardson said the result effectively increased the levy and demanded refunds, prompting a heated board exchange and calls for audits or referrals.
County Manager Brian presented the statutory basis and spreadsheet steps used to compute Beaufort Countys revenue-neutral tax rate at the boards May meeting, reading from General Statute 159-11 and the Local Government Commission template used by counties during reappraisal years.
Brian said the revenue-neutral property tax rate is "the rate that is estimated to produce revenue for the next fiscal year equal to the revenue that would have been produced for the next fiscal year by the current tax rate if no appraisal had occurred," and walked commissioners through audited valuation figures and a growth-factor adjustment (the countys six-year average growth of 2.33%). He said the computed revenue-neutral number was 44.51 cents per $100 of assessed value and the recommended budget used 44.5 cents after rounding.
Finance officer Anita then displayed the LGC spreadsheet on-screen and explained how staff pulled audited valuations, applied the average growth factor, and adjusted for the countys historical collection rate. She told commissioners that billed real-property levy versus budgeted assumptions left the county with a modest surplus on the levy in the current year (about $327,000, or roughly 0.8% of levy, according to the materials shown).
Commissioner Richardson responded that the revenue-neutral presentation hid an increase in the countys levy: "They never told the commissioners that they were raising revenue by 7.48%," he said, arguing staff and some commissioners had not given elected officials and residents the full levy-to-levy comparison. He called the circumstances "deception" and said taxpayers should get the money back.
Other commissioners and staff rejected that characterization at the dais. Anita and Brian pointed to the statutes required growth adjustment and to the collection-rate assumptions used in the calculations; one member corrected Richardsons fund-balance figure and another urged that concerns about criminality should be referred to the state auditor or district attorney if there was evidence of wrongdoing.
The exchange left the board sharply divided on tone and approach: several commissioners urged transparency and asked staff to keep producing the spreadsheets and underlying workpapers; Richardson pressed for immediate tax reductions and refunds; others said the county had followed statutory calculation steps and that policy choices about fund balance and levy ultimately rest with elected commissioners.
The board did not adopt an immediate policy change on the tax rate that night; staff said they would provide the underlying calculations and documentation used in the revenue-neutral worksheet and make themselves available to answer follow-up questions ahead of upcoming budget workshops.
