With property tax notices going out next week, your individual bill is likely to be $70 to $280 more than 2008

Perhaps you’ve missed the recent headlines about Georgia’s financial doldrums due to the economy.

But if you’re a property owner in Fayette County you sure won’t miss the fallout: a $70-to-$280 hike in property taxes due to a cancelled tax credit previously funded by the state legislature.

The tax increase will be reflected in the property tax bills that are scheduled to be mailed after Labor Day, according to Tax Commissioner George Wingo.

Technically, it’s a tax increase as much as it is the elimination of a tax cut proffered by the state legislature. Citing budget shortfalls wrought in part by a drastic decline in sales tax revenue, the legislature cancelled the Homeowner’s Tax Relief Grant this year.

The sliver of good news is that the HTRG loss only affects properties which have qualified for homestead exemptions. Properties which have not so qualified have never been able to take advantage of HTRG and thus their tax bills will remain unchanged.

Fayette’s property tax bills will be due Nov. 15 of this year.

All of Fayette’s local governments declined to raise their property tax millage rate this year. Meanwhile, the legislature has put a three-year freeze on property tax reassessments, which means the only homes that will increase in value this year (and thus have higher tax bills) are those that had improvements since last year’s assessments.