Board adopts property-tax administration cost-recovery plan; recoverable amount ~$2.6 million

The Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors on June 23 adopted the county’s property tax administration cost recovery plan (P-TAC) for use in fiscal 2025–26. Auditor-Controller staff reported total property-tax administration costs of about $12 million; state law permits a limited portion of those costs to be recovered from local taxing agencies, and staff calculated roughly $2.6 million as recoverable under the Revenue and Taxation Code and county ordinance.

Auditor-Controller Mandeep Dillon and property tax manager Nathan Embrey explained that the recoverable pool covers discrete functions: the Assessor’s valuation and roll administration, the Treasurer-Tax Collector’s billing and collection, the Auditor-Controller’s apportionment work, and Clerk of the Board support for assessment appeals. Because schools receive roughly 60 percent of property tax revenue but are statutorily exempt from P-TAC reimbursement, the county absorbs a large share of the unrecoverable expense.

Nathan Embrey said the recoverable allocation is distributed to affected agencies proportional to their share of property tax revenues; for each taxing entity the recoverable charge represents less than 2 percent of its property tax receipts. The staff presentation noted a 12.02 percent overall increase in P-TAC from the prior cycle, driven primarily by Assessor Office cost increases and staffing changes following prior shortages.

In public comment, a resident questioned whether the county was “raising property taxes” to collect P-TAC; staff clarified the P-TAC allocation is an internal apportionment of existing property tax revenue under statute and is not an additional tax on taxpayers themselves.

The board adopted the plan and authorized collection pursuant to Revenue and Taxation Code section 995.3 and county ordinance 4.44.010 by a unanimous 5-0 vote.