County Board workshop addresses fees, parks committees, space needs
The McLeod County Board of Commissioners indicated at a workshop Friday morning that it will continue to pursue lowering its per parcel rate for property tax assessments to about $8 per parcel from the current $10.50 per parcel.
Commissioner Paul Wright said the new rate will be bring the county more in line with what is being charged with private assessors.
Don Albrecht, clerk for Penn Township, said that townships and cities which hire private assessors are being doubly taxed, because they pay not only for the county assessor, but for the private assessor.
Commissioner Ron Shimanski argued that, conversely, it could be seen that when cities and townships were paying the $10.50 per parcel rate charged by the county, they were subsidizing lower rates in townships and cities with private assessors.
Albrecht also said that when the rate reduction was first brought up, it was as a step toward moving toward “true county” assessing, in which the county does all of the assessing for the county.
“We see this as an incremental way of coming at it,” Albrecht said of the reduced fee. He said that if the county does not charge at all for assessing, townships and cities which wish to use private assessors will be pressured by taxpayers to go with the county.
Wright still contended that the county board had been unaware that the county’s rate was so much higher than private assessors. He said dropping the rate will bring it to the “market price” charged by other assessors.
The board will take up the fee at its Feb. 7 meeting.
In other business, the board discussed whether it should combine its parks and trails committees.
Commissioner Doug Krueger said he was concerned about the recent Legacy grant received for improvements to the Dakota Trail in the Lester Prairie area.
Krueger said he was trying to figure out how the grant application got to be for a specific portion of the trail rather than the whole trail.
For more, see the Feb. 1 print edition of The Chronicle.