Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

Reappraisals In Prescott Are Nearly Complete

Appraisals on property within the Prescott city limits are about 40 percent complete.

The appraisal is being done because Nevada County is out of compliance with state law, and because it's been more than 10 years since property in the county has been appraised.

Tom Scott, president of Computer Assisted Mass Appraisals, spoke to the Prescott city Council at its regular meeting Monday, Feb. 21, on how the appraisals are going.

He first gave a background on his company, CAMA, telling where it has been working in the state already. Most recently CAMA completed its appraisal work in Lafayette County where, Scott said, there were only four challenges made to the findings.

The results of the appraisals, he told the council will have a direct effect on property values in Prescott and Nevada County.

This, Scott said, is because land prices have gone up since the last appraisal was done.

In the mid 1980s, he said, land values were static because of the high interest rates. In the 1990s, though, the interest rates dropped and land prices rose.

CAMA will be physically visiting every one of the approximately 16,000 parcels of land in Nevada County. Appraisers will inspect the property and measure all buildings there.

However, Scott said, the appraisers, who will be driving vehicles with magnetic CAMA signs, are not allowed to go inside homes. No appraisals will be done on the interior of any structure.

These appraisals will be done in about two years, Scott said.

Getting accurate appraisals is important, he continued, because 80 percent of property tax paid is used to fund school systems.

But, area residents shouldn't worry about their taxes "going through the roof." The idea, Scott said, is to get the property appraised at close to the market value of all other property in Nevada County.

Appraisals from other areas will not be used to determine the fair market value of land in Nevada County.

Once the assessments have been made, Scott said, they will be done every three years to keep them current.

However, he said, there will likely be three proposals on the ballot for the November General Election to have the property taxes in Arkansas removed completely.

Should this occur, all appraisal offices in courthouses across the state will be closed and the employees terminated.

One proposal, he said, proposes removing the property tax, but increasing the state's sales tax to 6.5 percent to help cover the money lost from property taxes.

For the time being, though, the appraisals are being done under state mandate. Scott said once they are finished the property owner will be sent a notice of valuation.

Should the owner disagree with the figures, they can challenge the issue by meeting with the county board of equalization.

If they are still not happy with the results, the next step is to talk with the quorum court, with the final option being circuit court when all other avenues have been exhausted.

As the law currently stands, Scott said, most owners would pay one-third of any increase in the first year, with it going to two-thirds the second year and all the third year.

This, he told the council, is to keep the property owner from getting hit with a large increase at one time.

The idea, though, he said, is to make sure all the property in the county is fairly and properly assessed.

Primarily, CAMA is a software business also doing appraisal work, Scott said. The company works in Arkansas, Louisiana and parts of South Carolina. The software compliments the appraisal work, and is used in most county assessor's offices in the state.