Assessor Treasurer-Tax Collector presentation

Assessor, Auditor &
Treasurer/Tax Collector
By Dale Stroud, LeRoy Anderson
& Dana Hollmer
ASSESSOR’S OFFICE – Dale Stroud
Assessor staffing:
16 full time employees • 1 Drafting person
• 1 Transfer clerk
• 3 Real Property support clerks
• 1 Support clerk dedicated to the
computer system
• 1 Business Property Clerk
• 1 Business Property Appraiser
• 5 Real Property Appraisers
• 1 Chief Appraiser (also does the
Williamson Act)
• Deputy Assessor
• Elected Assessor
Assessor’s Responsibility
It is the responsibility of the Assessor
to discover and assess all taxable
property within his or her
jurisdiction. This activity
culminates in the final product
described as the Assessment Roll.
Contents of the assessment roll are
specified in section 601 of the
revenue and taxation code.
These components are:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
The name and address, if known,
of the Assessee.
Land, by legal description.
Personal Property.
Description of possessory interest
sufficient to identify them.
The assessed land value.
The assessed improvement value.
The assessed value of any
improvements being assessed to
someone other than the land
owner.
The revenue district in which the
property is located.
The total taxable value
Proposition 13
Proposition 13 was passed by the voters in June of
1978. It implemented a system of property tax that
required the Assessor to establish a taxable value on
an individual property based on when the property
last changed ownership. This was to happen to all
property beginning with any property that had
changed ownership since March 1st 1975. Further
the Assessor was to determine a value for any new
construction activity as well. These new values went
into effect the following lien date after the activity.
Recognition of drops in value
In the election of November 1978 someone
realized that the new system provided the
Assessor no legal authority to drop values if need
be. This oversight was corrected by a
proposition being put on the ballot called
Proposition 8. This initiative instructed the
Assessor to recognize drops in value due to
market conditions and fluctuations.
Supplemental Assessments
In 1983 Senate Bill 813 passed. This was a bill to
generate money for schools that were suffering from
the loss of revenue caused by the passage of Prop.
13. This bill instructed the Assessor to not wait until
the following lien date to enter the new value but to
enter it on a “supplemental roll” to be effective the
1st day of the month following the month of the
activity. This generated revenue based on the
prorated portion of the tax year that this new value
was in existence.
Additional Duties of the Assessor
As part of the valuation responsibility, the Assessor must administer several support
activities that conclude with the Assessment roll production:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Produce Assessor’s Parcel Maps –
This is the method in which the
Assessor identifies the real
property being assessed.
Assigning of Parcel Numbers –
These are simply a tax
identification number for our use
only. They have no other legal
function or authority. These
numbers exist for secured and
unsecured properties.
Administering Homeowners
exemptions – Owner occupier.
Administering Welfare
exemptions- Religious, education
or qualifying non profits.
Administering Disabled veterans
exemptions – veterans with
disabilities.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
Valuation of business personal
property.
Valuation of boats.
Valuation of aircraft.
Valuation of Possessory Interests
– private beneficial use of other
wise tax exempt property.
Processing the Williamson Act
valuations and TPZ.
Williamson Act. Subvention
Application.
Valuation of mobile homes
Valuation of Natural gas wells
HOW THE PROPERTY TAX SYSTEM
WORKS
Real Property-Transfers of Ownership
Step 1:
• All recorded documents are
received from the Recorder
after recordation and
verification process. These are
delivered via a document
management system called
HAL file.
Transfers of Ownership
Drafting Department
• Recorder delivers the recorded
document and the Preliminary Change
in ownership statement (PCOR) to
Assessor . PCOR solicits specific
information concerning the transfer
and the financial details of the
transaction.
• At this location we review all recorded
documents to determine if they impact
our office. If not the copy is deleted.
If we need the copy it is imported into
the Assessor’s Hal file data base.
• The PCOR document is also scanned
into the Assessor Hal data base. These
two documents are linked together by
being indexed by APN, recorded
document number, name of grantee
and date of the activity.
• We will also review the recorded
document to verify the correct legal
description and APN.
• If there were legal description errors
or something that would impact our
ability to process the document it
would be identified here and
communication would result.
• Both PCOR and the recorded
document move from the drafting area
to the Transfer Clerk workstation.
Step 2:
At this workstation the following
activities take place:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Enter all updated information into our
Property Tax software (CREST).
Review the activity to determine the
need to communicate with the
taxpayer for any type of exclusion from
reappraisal or exemption application.
Any needed communication would be
stimulated here.
Review the activity to determine if this
action requires a reappraisal from this
office. This process can be very
complicated and cumbersome,
especially when multiple ownerships
are involved. What is transferring has
to be specifically identified.
The hard copy of the appraisal records
are also pulled at this workstation and
updated.
This person then would take the hard
copy appraisal record and file it in the
appropriate place. Either in an
appraiser work drawer for valuation or
back to the regular file because no
other action was warranted.
Step 3:
Valuation Step:
Here the appraisers actually take the
record with the appropriate activity
noted on the recorded out into the field.
Review the property to see if our
appraisal record accurately describes
what is there.
•
Comparable sales
•
Cost approach/income approach
•
Reach value conclusion
•
Update appraisal record
•
Calculate the supplemental
assessment
Forward record to appraisal support
where the new valuation
information is entered into the
CREST system.
New Construction
• As previously stated the Assessor is
legally obligated to appraise new
construction. However, the definition of
what is new construction is not always so
clear. Maintenance items are excluded
from the definition of new construction
unless; they become significant enough
to convert the improvement to the
substantial equivalent of new. Section 70
of the Revenue and Taxation code.
• Building permits are given to the
Assessor as required by R & T Code
section 72. We have 4 permit issuing
agencies in Tehama County. T. C.
Building dept., T. C. Environmental
Health, City of Corning and City of Red
Bluff.
• These permits are brought to one
appraisal support clerk in our office.
New Construction – con’t
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
These lists are reviewed to determine which
parcels they impact.
The hard copy of the appraisal record is
pulled at this workstation.
The permit activity is reviewed to determine
if the action qualifies as new construction.
If the activity does not qualify as new
construction, the activity is simply logged
onto the hard copy appraisal and filed back
into the regular file.
If the activity qualifies as new construction,
the activity is logged onto the record and
filed into the appraisal work drawer for a
field inspection and valuation.
Valuation process will be the same as
described earlier.
The appraiser will reach a value conclusion
for this new construction and calculate the
supplemental assessment that results.
•
•
•
The appraiser then turns this record into
appraisal support for the new valuation data
to be entered into the CREST system.
If this activity is for a new Residence the
appraisal support clerk would also make a
determination as to whether or not a
Homeowners exemption application should
be sent to this taxpayer.
Once the valuations for any activity, transfer
or new construction, get entered into the
CREST system these activities are “batched”
together once a month and delivered to the
Auditor to apply the tax rate. These values
will generate the supplemental assessments.
Williamson Act and TPZ
• Transfer & new construction – same as above
• Properties are valued with a restricted income
approach
• They receive the lesser of the current market,
Prop 13 factored base year value or the restricted
Williamson Act or TPZ value
Subvention application
This process takes us approximately 40 hours of time. The following items are
tracked for this report:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
The total number of acres that we had last year.
The amount of acreage that has come out since our last application.
The amount of acreage under non renewal.
The amount of contracted acreage that have come out because of public
acquisition.
The amount of acreage added since last year, if any.
Splits/Combination acreage.
Amount of acreage receiving a non restricted value.
Amount of acreage that is prime, that is eligible for subvention
Amount of acreage that is non prime, that is eligible for subvention.
Based on the last two items we calculate the dollar amount requested.
We also must prepare a map to submit with this application to reflect these
properties.
Business Personal Property
• This process begins with us requesting information about each
business operating within the Tehama County jurisdiction. These
requests are made with a state form called a 571. We send out a
printout with each active account listing all the items that we have
assessed to that account, and requesting each taxpayer to add items
if they have acquired anything additional and delete anything they
may have disposed of.
• After obtaining this information we value this property by applying
the appropriate depreciation schedule to the historical cost reported
by the taxpayer.
• We also perform audits to verify the accuracy of these assessments.
• A similar process is used in valuing the boats and aircraft.
Business Property
• Business accounts we have
2576
• Boats 1907
• Aircraft 209
Basic Information-Assessment Roll
•
•
•
•
•
Approximate number of Assessor’s Parcels – 44,000
Total Assessed Value as of 1-1-2013 $4,547,078,149
Roll peak value – 1-1-2008 $4,749,094,747
Roll bottom after peak 1-1-2012 - $4,072,374,215
Approximately – 13,000 Homeowners exemptions
file
• Approximately – Disabled Vets - 219
• Welfare exemption & Misc. exemptions 50
• About 800,000 acres in the Williamson Act
• Last requested Subvention amount was $930,031
Tehama County Assessor
A year in review
• As of 1-1-2013 Real Property appraisers
physically processed 7927 value conclusions.
• On an average this works out to be 1585 per
appraiser, assuming 250 working days this then
is over 6 value conclusions per day per
appraiser.
AUDITOR’S OFFICE – LeRoy Anderson
Auditor staffing:
12 full time employees • 10 from miscellaneous
bargaining unit
• Assistant Auditor
• Elected Auditor
Auditor Staffing
• Clearing house for all claims paid by the
departments & many special districts
• Compiles budget documents, monitors revenue
and expenses on a daily basis
• Process payroll for approximately 800
employees
• Bookkeeping services: Landfill, Social Services,
Public Guardian/Administrator and 30th DAA
Fair Board
• Property tax division
AUDITOR ROLE IN PROPERTY TAX
PROCESS:
• Tax Calculation on assessed values
• Forward to Tax Collector
• Apportion Collections
•
•
•
•
•
•
Work with five (5) separate Tax Rolls:
Current Year Secured
Current Year Unsecured
Supplemental
Prior Year Secured = Delinquent
Prior Year Unsecured = Delinquent
Secured Roll
Auditor receives Secured Property Tax assessments (values)
from Assessor July 1 / August 1
•
•
•
•
Calculate a tax for each parcel based on assessed value
Discharge low value parcels
Add (deduct) Homeowner’s exemption
Add voter approved bond charges (variable by year, calculated
in Auditor’s office)
• Add Special District Assessments
• Average 20 Districts with approximately 34,000 parcels
• Add State Assessed property to the Roll
• Pass an electronic file to the Tax Collector for Billing and
Collection
Unsecured Roll
Similar Process for Unsecured Property
• Smaller Roll
• Less complicated
Supplemental Roll
•Ongoing process
•Comes in batches called Entry Months
•Requires calculations similar to the Secured process
•Change in ownership involves proration of tax obligation
•May involve refunds
•Refunds are held for anyone with an outstanding property tax
obligation until paid, or held and applied to that future payment
at owners direction
Electronic file passed to Tax Collector for billing and collection
Prior Year Secured
- Also referred to as
Secured Abstract, Delinquent payments
• Teeter County
• The Special Districts receive their full Property Tax
allocations ‘as if the bill had been paid in total’
• Does not include Special Assessments
• County gets the interest and penalty on the delinquent
tax payment, District gets the assessment and interest
on the assessment upon payment
Prior Year Unsecured
Smaller tax roll
Apportionments:
Tax Collector submits Collection reports to the
Auditor.
• Auditor records collections by Tax Rate Area
• Apportionment Journal is created and funds
transferred appropriately
• Each agency has their own fund(s)
• Payments made to Cities and Districts with money
outside of County Pooled Treasury in January and
May/June.
• Other agency funds retained in treasury as their
‘bank’.
HOW YOUR PROPERTY TAXES ARE
ALLOCATED 2013/2014 Allocation Factors, Portion of each
Dollar collected
County
.187665
County Fire
.058718
County subtotal
.246383
Cities
.040592
Special Districts
.034466
Cities/Districts subtotal
.075058
Schools
.509192
ERAF
.169367
Schools/ERAF subtotal
TOTAL
.678559
1.00000
1.00000
Education Revenue Augmentation Fund
(ERAF)
Just for informational purposes, although technically not part of our
allocation process, due to accounting gimmicks and gymnastics at the State
level, the Counties and Cities receive Property Tax Revenue in Lieu of
Vehicle License Fee (VLF) and in Lieu of Sales & Use Tax from the ERAF
Fund.
Amounts received in FY 2013/14
• County in Lieu of VLF
$5,882,859
• County in Lieu of Sales Tax
$ 691,893
• Cities in Lieu of VLF
$ 1,517,890
• Cities in Lieu of Sales Tax
$ 1,581,350
While the Property Tax process is an important function that takes place in
the Auditor’s office, it is only one of many. There are two employees, out of
a staff of 10, devoted full time to the Property Tax workflow.
Other functions can be discussed separately.
TREASURER/TAX COLLECTOR’S OFFICE
– Dana Hollmer
Treasurer/Tax Collector staffing:
6 full time employees –
• 4 from miscellaneous
bargaining unit
• Assistant Treasurer/Tax
Collector
• Elected Treasurer/Tax
Collector
HOW DO PROPERTY TAXES IN
CALIFORNIA COMPARE?
Tax Collections 2013-2014
YOUR SECURED PROPERTY TAX BILL
• WHEN ARE THEY DUE?
• The first installment of
secured property tax is due on
November 1st and becomes
delinquent after December
10th.
• The second installment is due
February 1st and becomes
delinquent after April 10th. If
the delinquent date falls on a
weekend or holiday, you have
until the close of the next
business day to pay your bill.
SUPPLEMENTAL TAX BILLS
• State law requires the
reassessment of property
upon a change of ownership
or completion of new
construction. If applicable
you will receive a
Supplemental tax bill
reflecting the change in value
for the balance of the tax year.
• WHY IS A SUPPLEMENTAL
TAX BILL ISSUED?
• Annual Secured tax bills are
based on the taxable value as
of January 1st. A Supplemental
tax bill will be generated based
on the difference between the
New Taxable Value and the
Prior Taxable Value.
• Supplemental tax bills are
generally mailed six to twelve
months after a change of
ownership or completion of
new construction.
NEW HOMEOWNER CHECKLIST
Motivating forces behind automation
1.
Problem payments. Errors
in addition, transpose
amounts, parcel previously
paid
2. Phone calls. (I can’t find my
bill, I lost my bill, I didn’t get
my bill).
3. Postage costs
4. Website is available 24 x 7
Information is available
online……http://tax.tehama.us
BENEFITS
Shopping Cart feature
Information automatically
updated each night
Available 24 x 7
Taxpayer can retrieve and
print information
Eliminates human error
DRAWBACKS
User pays ‘convenience
fee’
Fee is 2.50% of the tax
amount
Can be expensive if paying a
large tax bill
Credit Card Payment
Summary
April & December collections are
highest collecting $350,000 - $400,000
each period.
Annually approximately $1,000,000 is
collected.
Approximately 80% of the credit card
payments are made online, 10% over the
phone and 10% over the counter.
We expect the counter payments to
increase because they are the most
recent payment option.
Hope to offer e-Bills in the near future.
Tax defaulted land sale
• Property on which taxes remain unpaid at 12:01 a.m. on
July 1 becomes tax-defaulted land. Property that is taxdefaulted after five years becomes subject to the county
tax collector's power to sell that property in order to
satisfy the defaulted taxes.
• The county tax collector may offer the property for sale
at public auction, through a sealed bid sale, or through a
negotiated sale to a public agency or qualified nonprofit
organization.
• Public auctions are the most common way of selling taxdefaulted property. The auction is conducted by the
county tax collector, and the property is sold to the
highest bidder.
Tax Sale results – last 10 years
Year
Number of parcels sold
2004
36
$ 330,783
2005
11
388,229
2007
2
32,526
2009
7
4,581
2011
17
21,359
2013
35
327,930
2014
3
100,092
TOTAL
Excess Proceeds
Available
$1,205,500
TREASURER’S OFFICE
•
•
•
•
•
Take in deposits
Manage daily cash flow
Invest funds
Reconcile daily paid items
Communication between bank
and county
departments/schools.
• Balance daily cash statement
with bank and auditor’s office
Tehama County Investments
as of 4/30/14
DESCRIPTION
percent
in dollars
CD'S
4.37% $
5,915,000
CORPORATE
9.23% $
12,500,000
FNMA
23.63% $
32,000,000
FHLMC
14.77% $
20,000,000
FHLB
11.82% $
16,000,000
FFCB
6.65% $
9,000,000
LAIF
29.54% $
40,000,000
$
135,415,000
TOTAL
• CD’s – in $250,000
increments, insured by FDIC
• Corporates – PFM Financial
Management
• FNMA – Agency issue (Federal
National Mortgage Assoc)
• FHLMC – Agency Issue
(Federal Home Loan Mortgage
Corp)
• FHLB – Agency issue (Federal
Home Loan Bank)
• FFCB – Agency issue (Federal
Farm Credit Bank)
• LAIF – State of California
Tehama County - Investment distribution by type
4/30/14
CD'S
4%
LAIF
29%
CORPORATE
9%
FNMA
24%
FFCB
7%
FHLB
12%
FHLMC
15%
Technology update
Departments on shared network:
1. Administration (BOS,
County Counsel, PG,
Personnel)
2. Assessor
3. Auditor
4. Tax Collector
5. Recorder/Clerk of the Board
6. Elections
7. Building/Planning
8. Environmental Health
Network Recap
• Wireless bridge ‘microwave’
from Admin office to Annex
• Redundant Internet at both
physical locations
• Layer 3 switch to process
traffic between department
endpoints, buildings, VPN’s &
servers
• Layer 2 storage switches to
process traffic between servers
and shared storage
• Battery backup – 1o minutes
to shut down properly
• Offsite digital backup each
night
VIRTUAL SERVER
1. Exchange 2010
2. Domain, Print server, AV
Server 2008
3. Halfile database
4. Halfile Terminal Server
5. PDC Terminal Server
6. Questys/IQM2 (Clerk of the
Board)
7. EIMS (Elections)
8. Decade (Environmental
Health)
SAN/TS Terminology
What is a SAN?
• Storage Area Network device
• Removes storage from the servers and consolidates
it is a place where it can be accessed by any
application
What is Terminal Services?
• A component of Microsoft Windows that allows a
user to take control of a remote computer over a
network connection. All input from the client
system is transmitted to the server, where software
execution takes place. (Thin Client, Remote Desktop
Services, RDP – Remote Desktop Protocol)
SAN & Terminal Server upgrade
Met on May 6th to establish next 4 week timeline
and ensure no interference with the election.
• 2 SANs will be installed providing hard drive
failover and additional network storage
Ø2 – 12 Terabyte SANs (1,000 Megabytes = 1
Gigabyte, 1,000 Gigabytes – 1 Terabyte)
ØExtra space needed for Auditor’s project,
archiving Recorder images and future growth
SAN & Terminal Server upgrade – p 2
• Remove Apex loaned equipment
• Upgrading VMWare – (platform under OS)
ØIf one server were to fail it would automatically roll
over to another server and be up and running in 3
minutes
ØHigher uptime, if something happens on the
weekend it will keep everything up and running
ØMaintenance can be done at anytime, no down time
ØTaking networking off the Sonicwall where it is
bottlenecking, moved to higher end layer 3 Cisco
switch
Tehama County Website –
front end and back end functions
Website features
v Working in live environment
v Granular permissions – Users
can be given permission to
specific areas only
v Several departments manage
changes to their own pages
v Internal login area for internal
forms and publications
v Website links to other county
sites (IQM2, Neogov, Taxes &
external department sites)
v Always trying to improve the
website, send requests my way
TEHAMA COUNTY
Dale Stroud
Assessor
444 Oak St – Room B
(530) 527-5931
LeRoy Anderson
Auditor
444 Oak St – Room J
(530) 527-3474
Dana Hollmer
Treasurer/Tax Collector
444 Oak St – Room D
(530) 527-4535