State approves 20% drop in tax values
BY PAM BRANNON Gulf Breeze News news@gulfbreezenews.com

Pam Brannon/Gulf Breeze News Santa Rosa County Property Appraiser Greg Brown was in Navarre two weeks ago explaining why he challenged the state on his tax rolls this year.

Santa Rosa County Property Appraiser Greg Brown got some good news this week. The state finally approved his tax rolls, despite lowering property values by 20 percent. Brown said the state didn't want him to lower assessments by more than 15 percent.

This year, Brown and Escambia County Property Appraiser, Chris Jones, were the two last appraisers out of 67 counties to have their tax rolls approved because they both insisted on lowering property tax values by 20 percent.

Escambia County officials also had their tax rolls approved by the state this week.

Brown had a meeting almost two weeks ago with state officials to show why he believed he needed to lower property values in Santa Rosa County more than 15 percent. The state could have refused his rolls, and told him to go back to the drawing board to come up with no less than a 15 percent decrease. If he had refused, the state could go as far as removing him from office and sending someone to Santa Rosa County to fill his position. The state has no ceiling on how high property appraisers are allowed to increase property values. However, just because the state approved his tax rolls does not mean tax bills can go out right away - even though this delays the process for governmental taxing agencies.

"Now we send out the value notices to residents, letting them know what their new property value is and what their taxes will be on the property," Brown said. "Residents have 25 days to appeal that. Then we have to wait until all taxing agencies, like the county and fire departments and cities and school board have their tax hearings before we can certify the rolls. Then, tax bills can be sent out."

Taxing agencies in the county usually plan budgets and fiscal years around the tax dollars starting to flow back in by November. Bills should be sent out in plenty of time for that to still happen, thanks to the state approving those rolls.