Hartford

To Address Revaluation Reform

By Jan Howard

Two bills to be presented to the Connecticut General Assembly this session could bring changes to a current law regarding revaluations of property.

State Rep Pamela Z. Sawyer has submitted two bills for action in the current session that, if approved, would provide towns with a three-year moratorium on their revaluations and extend the current four-year interim revaluation requirement to six years.

Last year Rep Sawyer said she tried to push for a three-year moratorium on revaluations. However, she noted, “It didn’t go anywhere. It’s too bad, particularly for the smaller towns.”

What has made the revaluations so expensive is that there are few companies that provide the service.

The Council of Small Towns (COST) has put revaluation change as a legislative priority, she said. Out of Connecticut’s 169 towns, 100 are small towns, she noted.

“This is a budget buster in hard times,” she said.

When the current law was enacted, it was thought that revaluations would cost only about $15,000, Rep Sawyer said. That has not been the case. “Huge amounts are being spent,” on revaluations, she noted, at a time when the state has pulled back on funding to municipalities.

Rep Sawyer said that a change in revaluation requirements to a longer term would mean the state was being responsive to the towns’ economic conditions.

She said she would be willing to repeal the current bill until revaluations can be done fairly.

“Towns should be able to spend their dollars on things that matter to them,” she said, such as for the elderly or to purchase open space.

State Rep Julia Wasserman (R-106) of Newtown said last week that lawyers are currently working on the bill. She noted the proposed bill must go through the committee process and be approved and raised by committee before it could be considered by the full house.

She said she voted against the 1995 bill that changed the revaluation process. “I am not happy with the system,” she noted.

 “A lot of groups are pressing for a longer term,” First Selectman Herb Rosenthal said recently, such as the Connecticut Council of Small Towns (COST) and the Connecticut Council of Municipalities (CCM).

“Taxpayers should put pressure on the legislature to lengthen the process,” he said. “Every four years is too frequent.” Every six years would be a good compromise, he said.

State Senator John McKinney said he had heard discussion about problems relating to revaluations and the possibility that a bill would be proposed to lengthen the time between them.

“If the bill is important to Newtown,” he said, “I’d be glad to hear from them.”

He said one of the reasons the law was changed in 1995 was because some cities would obtain special exemptions that would put off the revaluations, sometimes for up to 20 years.

Mr Rosenthal said that the 1995 bill came about because of lobbying by CBIA and other business interests that do not want longer intervals between revaluations. “They feel they’re being overtaxed,” he said. “They pressed for shorter terms.”

A Legislative Action Guide submitted by the Connecticut Council of Small Towns (COST) states, “Municipalities need significant relief from the inordinately expensive ‘statistical’ revaluations they are required to perform under Connecticut statutes.”

COST strongly urged the General Assembly to make the reforms to the state’s revaluation mandate. It also urged the legislature to consider other ways and means to provide towns with relief from the unexpectedly high cost of the required revaluations. 

Newtown and other municipalities, under the current law, are required under the 1995 legislation to revalue properties every four years between physical revaluations, which are required every 12 years. The four-year revaluations reflect changes in the value of property that was physically assessed. Previously, state law required physical revaluations every ten years, and an interim revaluation within five years of the last physical revaluation.

To do the revaluation correctly, Mr Rosenthal said every property has to be physically visited within the 12-year period. The four-year revaluations are done by analyzing real estate sales over an 18-month period through state formulas and guidelines that do not skew the revaluation to benefit any one group more than another.

According to an Office of Legislative Research report, frequent revaluations reduce the disparity between assessed and market value of properties, but can be expensive for municipalities to administer. Newtown is budgeting $450,000 over three budget years to finance the next revaluation that is scheduled for 2006 unless a longer term is approved by the legislature before then.

According to Assessor Denise Hames, every property was inspected in 2002. She said it costs from $38 to $50 per parcel to revalue Newtown’s 11,000 properties.

Mr Rosenthal said the town would draw up a contract with a private company for work that it would provide over a three-year period. He said there are only five companies that have the ability to conduct a revaluation in Newtown.