Friday, June 28, 2002

Commission lowers tax rate

In a stunning turn of events, the Fulton County Board of Commissioners unanimously passed a revenue neutral property tax rate last week.

Chairman Kenn's motion for the revenue neutral millage rate - enthusiastically seconded by Commissioners Bob Fulton and Tom Lowe - came two weeks after the Board of Commissioners voted (4-3) to advertise a higher tax rate. After several minutes of discussion the board finally passed the lower rate.

"I am glad that after nearly three years of intense debate that we have finally taken a positive step - and this is only the first step - in addressing our citizen's property taxes," Chairman Kenn said after the vote.

He continued, "Fulton County has some of the highest tax rates in the state - and I will continue the fight to lower taxes further every year that I am in office."

Two weeks ago, the Board of Commissioners discussed and ultimately passed a tax rate that captured a so-called rate of inflation (approximately 3%).

Chairman Kenn, Commissioner Fulton and Commissioner Tom Lowe objected to capturing any rate of inflation for the sake of collecting more revenues.

Chairman Kenn said at the time, "I don't believe its right or fair for the Board of Commissioners to have some kind of windfall because of the increasing property tax assessments of so many of our citizens."

Since Fulton County conducted property value reassessments that resulted in an increase of approximately 12% in the total valuation of the tax digest, the issue before the board last week was to decide how much the county would try and offset those increases via a millage rate reduction.