City of La Crosse says property reassessment won’t impact many property owners
LA CROSSE (WKBT) — The City of La Crosse recently sent homeowners their 2022 Notice of Assessment. For some families, the property value increase is tens of thousands of dollars, but La Crosse Mayor Mitch Reynolds says homeowners should not panic.
Inside four walls and a roof, memories are made that last a lifetime.
“The graduation of all three of my daughters. That was awesome,” said La Crosse resident Marvin Jacobson.
Jacobson has lived in his La Crosse home for decades.
“Real close to 20 years,” Jacobson said.
Following a city-wide 2022 property reassessment, Jacobson’s property assessment increased by $43,500.
“The taxes are probably going to be ridiculous on the little piece of land that we have,” said Jacobson.
Back in 2019, the city of La Crosse assessed property values for the first time in 10 years.
“Because of the lack of regularity the city had been doing this process, we had gotten out of compliance,” said Mayor Reynolds.
Mayor Reynolds says if the city did not take action, the state would have done the assessment through a private assessor and charged taxpayers for it. Reynolds says according to Wisconsin state statutes, properties are required to be within 10% of market values. The 2019 assessment did not bring the city in line.
“Even with those, we were still at that lower 84% value and I think this revaluation is expected to get us there,” said Reynolds.
While property assessments may have increased Reynolds says, “no, your property taxes won’t necessarily increase.”
According to Reynolds, the mill rate will decrease, meaning many residents will pay the same amount of property taxes, or even less. A few residents will see an increase in their taxes by a small amount if their properties were extremely undervalued.
“Well that’s a big relief to hear,” said Jacobson.
Jacobson says he wants the city to update assessments frequently so that property owners aren’t caught by surprise.
“An older couple seeing their house go up $40,000 in a year’s time could possibly cause them to have a heart attack,” he said.
Reynolds also says he wants to access properties frequently, so situations like this one can be avoided. Residents can file an appeal to lower their assessment, but Reynolds says for many that will not change their property taxes.
The deadline to file an appeal is 10 a.m. Friday, November 11.
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