This is very confusing, but here it goes. After the County Reassessment, our millage will decrease by 4.54 mills to 22.61 mills. But it is still a .42 millage increase. No fund balance will be used. Jan Klein will be setting aside funds that will not show up in the budget for appeals. Asbury Heights and Concordia are the biggest appeals.
Larry Lebowitz commented on the outstanding grievance. The fund balance will be used if the grievance is awarded to union.
What I don't understand is how the municipality put this information in their agenda and shared it with residents on Friday, but the school board has to keep it under wraps.
The question remains about the gaming revenue. Still no final budget posted anywhere.
New Mills Final Budget
24 comments:
This comment was sent to me via email. Perhaps someone can take a stab at explaining this to us??
Read your post and man is this confusing.
Especially considering that the budget was balanced according to discussions by raising millage from 27.13 to 27.67 mills. Now it will be knocked down to 22.61 mills.
So I ran some quick numbers on properties.
Cappucci:
2012- $253,000 at 27.13 = $6,863.80
2013- $292,000 at 22.61 = $6,602.12
A SD tax cut of $261.77
Posti: (perhaps there is a God)
2012- $166,500 at 27.13 = $4,517.15
2013- $258,100 at 22.61 = $5,835.64
A SD tax increase of $1,318.49
Raja: (purchased in '09 at $920,000)
2012- $465,500 at 27.13 = $12,615.45
2013- $804,000 at 22.61 = $18,178.44
A SD tax increase of $5,562.99
I haven't double checked my numbers, but my seat of the pants guess is that there aren't enough Posti/Raja properties with higher 2013 assessed increase to balance out the Cappucci-like values that will see decreases.
My gut feeling is that the 22.61 won't be the final millage. This is too confusing as I said. They balanced the preliminary budget using 22.67 mills on the total MTL valuation.
How can they drop mills to 22.61?????
Another comment sent via email:
Here's an interesting study.
I took the first 13 homes on Osage and totaled their 2012 and 2013 assessed values. Then multiplied 2012 total value by 27.13 mills and 2013 total value by 22.61. (at a glance if the whole road was totaled I think the 2013 taxes would actually be less than 2012, but that just a guess!)
Total 2012 value - $3,950,800
Total 2012 value - $4,817,200
2012 yielded $107,185.20 in SD taxes
2013 yielded $108,916.89
An increase of just $1,731.69 in taxes for 2013.
Then did the same for the homes on my street.
2012 yielded $39,593.52 in taxes
2013 yielded $42,656.03
A $3,062.51 increase.
Another way to look at it...
The Sunset Hills homeowners are paying an average of $278.41 more in SD taxes.
The 13 Virginia Manor people are paying an average $133.21 more.
It'd be nice to figure for the complete Osage street but there are just too many homes to do by hand.
Now I'm really confused!
In the Budget documents available on the district website, they list Assessed Value (Total for Community???)
2011-12: $2,173,384,611
2012-13: $2,171,005,011
Does this mean the total value of MTL dropped by $2,379,600? If that is true, how can they drop millage from 27.13 to 22.16?
Wouldn't that contradict the claim that the school district keeps our property values high?
Sorry, if I'm off base here, none of this makes sense. How can the district cut mills amnd pay for an increase in expenditures?
I do have a Mt. Lebanon math background, so I may have this wrong. Millage went from 27.13 to 22.61 mills. That is a 16.66% decrease. Did I read somewhere that the average MTL reassessment went up 27%? If so, isn't that close to a 10.5% increase in our school taxes? Jan will be holding onto the balance in a separate account and MAY use that three years from now, if the appeals are finalized.Didn't she say that instead of raising taxes, they could just use that?
Tom Moertel or James Fraasch, what is your take on this?
Elaine
Nope, here it is. 26%.
http://www.county.allegheny.pa.us/averageinc.aspx
Elaine
I received some emails asking how to calculate their tax bills.
Granted, I was transfixed by the 1972 construction, so I am sure readers will set me straight, if I have given you incorrect information.
To calculate your new tax bill, Go to http://www2.county.allegheny.pa.us/realestate/Search.aspx Multiply your 2013 house assessed value by .2261. Your old 2012 assessed value was multiplied by .2713.
In my case, my county reassessment went up 27.49%, 1.5% more than the average.
Jan Klein has reduced the millage by 16.66%. My taxes are going up.
Elaine
Elaine: Isn't Asbury Heights tax exempt ? 700 Bower Hill Rd.
Concordia is @ 1300Bower Hill Rd. and remained the same.
Multiply your 2013 house assessed value by .2261.
I thought yours was the financially savvy party? Do you actually think that the school tax is 22.61%? And also, there is still the county and municipal tax segments (4.73 and 4.51 respectively). Thus, residents can expect a 31.85 aggregate millage in 2013. So, to find your total real estate tax bill, multiply your 2013 assessment by 0.03185. The millages have been roughly adjusted so that those whose assessments are up by more than 24% will see their taxes rise, and everyone else will see a reduction.
Thanks, 2:53 PM. I knew you wouldn't pass up an opportunity to make me look stupid. I can't help myself. I am a Mt. Lebanon graduate.
To find the school district taxes, multiply by .02261.
I haven't even discussed county and muni taxes. This is just about the district budget which was "revealed" last night.
Elaine
I might submit that your inability to do a very basic tax calculation calls into question all your other Chicken Little tax prognostications.
Perhaps I could derive some insult from your name to really drive the point home? On second thought, that would be childish.
3:15, for the enlightenment of us all... what very basic tax calculation do you use to figure your school district tax bill?
Yeah, I am pretty much a screw up. I can't do any math. Our tax dollars at work.
You can call me Lanie. I don't mind. I respond to pretty much anything. Thanks for reading.
Elaine
Elaine, your not as screwed up as some board members that think a .54mill increase is the same as a zero mill increase.
Funny how we didn't see any criticism on that calculation!
A .54 mill increase on a $100,000 is $54 by my calculations.
A zero mill increase on a $100,000 is $0.
How come you weren't all over Mr. Cooper for Chicken Little Tax prognostications, 3:15?
My taxes went up by 23 Cooper pizzas.
Funny how we didn't see any criticism on that calculation!
You didn't see any? I did!!!
Finally!
http://www.mtlsd.org/district/budget/stuff/budget%20summary%20may%2013.pdf
http://www.mtlsd.org/district/budget/stuff/assess.value.pdf
http://www.mtlsd.org/district/budget/stuff/proposed_budget_reductions_5.13.pdf
Elaine
Meant at the board meeting when it was said. I believe Mrs. Cappucci said something like let's not go there just yet or something along those lines.
But the comparison slid by 'uncorrected' by Dr. Steinhauer, Jan or any director.
There were corrections/criticisms made here, of course. Though nobody ever applauds Elaine or her 'wingnuts' when they get the math right.
3:15 is Johnny-on-the-spot though if somebody misses a zero.
10:49 the millage went down because the total Mount Lebanon assessments went up. The samples used are too small to be an accurate reflection of the total assessment of our community.
Also individual home values are confusing to the overall discussion.
11:49 and 10:53 we are doing the budget for fiscal year 2013-2014 so we have to use the new assessments not the old assessment.
2:28 Asbury and Concordia are appealing their assessments. It is likely a portion of their properties will be ruled not taxable based upon usage. This is a complicated legal item.
OK 6:55, so what is the total assessed value for 2013-14?
Yes the sampling at 10:49, (aren't you referring to 10:53) are: too small to make any accurate deductions.
But are they interest and seem to be backed up by the studies posted on Blogebo a year or so ago.
Now there could be some rational explanations. The upscale properties could have been wildly overassessed in 2012 and the 2013 assessments are more in line with reality. Then the opposite could be true for the lower end properties. Again the bloglebo study didn't seem to support that theory.
Wonder is there a street by street, neighborhood by neighborhood or Ward by Ward tally of the total assessed values for each avaiable anywhere?
It could be a total waste if time.
6:55 the values for the properties at 10:53 are the county numbers for 2012 and the new 2013 reassessment so they're accurate for the 2013-14 budget sans any appeals that haven't been posted by the county yet.
The two streets picked were just arbitrary and they don't even show the whole street. Started at the top of the county page for tne high end and the low end.
8:00 the total assessment will be found in the final budget documents to be voted on next week. What counts is the total assessment when you set the new millage rate.
Thanks 9:45. Look forward to reading it.
2012, 2013, 27.67, 22.61, county numbers for 2013 are new numbers, 27.67 millage is based on 2012 values, rate is dropped for windfall correction.
Makes your head spin. especially when you think the budget documents have been updated in a timely manner.
OK, our samplings may be too small, there may be confusion regarding which numbers are which, but we can't all be wrong.
There is this similar finding reported in Bloglebo a while back:
"
SUNDAY, OCTOBER 07, 2012
Assessment update: County’s own analysis shows a regressive bias in Mt. Lebanon
POSTED BY TOM MOERTEL AT 11:36 PM /
This article is part of a series examining how Mt. Lebanon is likely to be affected by the recent county-wide reassessment. For other articles in the series, see Blog-Lebo’s Reassessment Series. —Tom
Via Chris Briem’s blog, I learned that the county hired an independent team to review the recent assessment process. That team’s report is offered as Exhibit 4 of a recent court filing, part of the ongoing court case at the center of the controversy.
The findings of the independent review support Blog-Lebo’s conclusion from Marchthat the new assessments for Mt. Lebanon are unfairly biased toward overtaxing owners of low-end properties and undertaxing owners of high-end properties. In particular, the report gives the independent reviewers’ estimate of the coefficient of price-related bias for Mt. Lebanon as about –7.5% (see page 19 of the report; look for the PRB-coefficient value for school district 26, Mt. Lebanon)."
10:16 this link on the assessments may be helpful to many:
http://www.mtlsd.org/district/budget/stuff/assess.value.pdf
Copy and paste it into your browser.
Post a Comment