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Collector details enrollment, outreach as commission adopts ordinance to streamline senior tax-credit renewals
Summary
Cass County Collector Chris Mollendorf told commissioners 9,466 seniors enrolled in the new property tax credit (saving roughly $3.6 million), described administrative problems with renewals, and the commission adopted Ordinance 26-01 to simplify renewals and reduce burdens on seniors.
The Cass County Commission on the record adopted Ordinance 26-01 from the Collector's Office to amend county code related to the senior citizen property tax credit. Collector Chris Mollendorf presented program data and explained why the ordinance change would ease the annual renewal burden on seniors.
"We had 9,466 senior households sign up for the program," Mollendorf said, and as of the morning of the meeting "all of them paid except 151 households." He also said staff discovered and corrected 13 mistaken bills and estimated the enrolled households saved approximately $3,600,000.
Mollendorf described operational challenges during renewal: postcards sent to households were frequently lost or ignored, creating heavy staff workload for follow-up calls and door knocks. To limit burdens on seniors, he said the county would use daily deed monitoring and access to the national death file via LexisNexis to identify homeowners who are no longer eligible (for example, because they sold the home or died). He gave the county's planned open-enrollment window for new applicants as April 13 through July 2.
On the ordinance change, Mollendorf said the intent is to allow currently enrolled seniors to remain enrolled without reapplying every year: "Enjoy your tax credit until you die or sell the home." He said the county would notify enrolled residents after the commission's action and use written letters that are more likely to be opened than the postcards used previously.
Mollendorf also noted the county was an early implementer of the law and said there may be legal challenges ahead, referencing pending state bills during his remarks. He said he had sent statutorily required notices to taxing districts (fire, ambulance, road and bridge, and school boards) detailing enrollment counts and projected revenue loss. The chair then called for and announced the ordinance vote, which passed on the record.
