Reassessments due

INDIANAPOLIS - Indiana counties are racing to complete a statewide property reassessment by spring, but confusion over new rules and other delays could mean some tax bills will arrive late.\nExperts who are monitoring the reassessment say many counties are struggling to learn an overhauled system for evaluating property, including all-new tax rules, manuals and software.\n"Everybody is working under uncertainty," David Bottorff, legislative director for the Association of Indiana Counties, said Wednesday while addressing a meeting of county finance officials from throughout the state.\n"It's discouraging to public officials who have to set those tax rates to set their budget. It's also kind of unfair to taxpayers who have no idea what their tax rate is going to be next year," he said.\nThe result could be tax bills that arrive in some places as late as May or early June, rather than by April, Bottorff said.\nAssessments are the basis for the state's property tax system, which finances schools and governments. Assessors gather information about homes and calculate a value that is multiplied by the tax rate to determine the amount owed by property owners.\nThe Indiana Supreme Court has ordered the state to change the rules it uses to assess property, meaning assessments must now be based on objective information, such as land values and the sale prices of neighboring homes.\nBut until wrinkles are ironed out of the revamped system, many of Indiana's 92 counties are struggling to carry out the plan approved by the General Assembly at the end of this year's special session.\n"There are still a lot of unknowns," said Christopher Johnson, a partner with Crowe, Chizek and Co., an accounting and consulting firm in Indianapolis.\nThe reassessment is further complicated by the fact that assessors are up for election on Nov. 5. As many as a third of them will not return to office in January because they chose not to seek another term or lost their bid for re-election.\nThat means new auditors will be taking office just as counties enter the final stages of reassessment, potentially creating more confusion, Bottorff said.\nThe exact effect of reassessment on tax bills is unclear, although lawmakers passed measures designed to curb anticipated increases.\nThe process of changing the state's property tax system has been delayed a number of times by legal challenges and a decision by Gov. Frank O'Bannon that halted progress in 1999.\n"Out of this chaos, we certainly hope there's a system that lasts another 20 years or so before we have to go through any substantial changes like this," Bottorff said.