Muscogee County School Board cuts taxes for first time in 21 years

For the first time in 21 years, the Muscogee County School Board has given property taxpayers a break, although it amounts to a political gesture amid the Columbus Consolidated Government’s controversial revaluations, which have increased tax assessments on some parcels by as much as tenfold.

In a called meeting Tuesday morning, the board rolled back the millage rate from 23.37 to 23.321, resulting in a decrease of $250,204 in the local revenue the Muscogee County School District could receive. But because of the citywide property revaluations, the decreased millage rate still is projected to increase MCSD’s local revenue by approximately $4.9 million.

The school board’s tentative rollback of the millage rate translates to a savings of $1.79 on the property tax bill for the owner of a parcel with a homestead exemption and a fair market value of $125,000. The for non-homestead property with a fair market value of $175,000 will be $3.43.

Even with the rollback, MCSD’s millage rate still is the third-highest among 159 counties in the state, trailing only Rockdale and DeKalb, as of 2016 figures compiled by DeKalb County Board of Education member Stan Jester.

MCSD’s fiscal year 2018 budget was projected to include $115,185,228 in local revenue out of $270,519,736 in total revenue and $288,819,039 in total expenditures and transfers when the board adopted it in June. But that was before this civic snafu stew simmered then boiled over this summer, when the public realized a perfect storm of a citywide property reassessment and a new software system in the Muscogee County Tax Commissioner and Tax Assessor’s office combined to produce shocking tax bills.

Before the called meeting to vote on the revised millage rate, the board on Tuesday morning also conducted its third and final public hearing on the proposal. Just like the previous two hearings, nobody from the public spoke for or against the proposal. Neither did anybody attend who wasn’t connected with MCSD or the media. And after debating the subject for nearly two hours during its Aug. 25 called meeting, when it rejected the administration’s recommendation to keep the millage rate at 23.37, the board didn’t discuss it again Tuesday morning before voting on final adoption.

The nine-member board’s vote was 6-0. Chairwoman Pat Hugley Green of District 1, Vanessa Jackson of District 3, Naomi Buckner of District 4, Laurie McRae of District 5 and Cathy Williams of District 7 were in attendance, and Mark Cantrell of District 6 participated via phone.

As she made the motion to approve the revised millage rate, Williams said she is “recognizing this isn’t a huge rollback, but it is – and I think it’s important to say – the first time in at least 21 years that this board has taken action to alleviate (for) our taxpayers some of the burden of their taxes.”

The millage rate, as explained by Investopedia.com, is “the amount per $1,000 used to calculate taxes on property. Millage rates are most often found in personal property taxes, where the expressed millage rate is multiplied by the total taxable value of the property to arrive at the property taxes due.”

This story was originally published September 12, 2017 at 11:05 AM with the headline "Muscogee County School Board cuts taxes for first time in 21 years."