Speaking at a meeting of the town’s Intergovernmental Relations Committee, Councilman John Safay called the bill “an appalling piece of legislation,” and Councilman Ken Heitzke said it was “a terrible thing to pass at the last minute.”
They said they will ask the full council to oppose the bill, which is awaiting the signature of Gov. Mark Sanford. The governor has not indicated whether he will sign the bill into law. If he signs it, the bill will become mandatory in all of the state’s 46 counties.
The bill caps property value increases during a five-year period at 20 percent no matter how much the property’s value actually went up. Under the bill, a $200,000 Beaufort County house whose value is recalculated this year could not be taxed at more than $240,000.
The value of some Beaufort County properties is expected to jump 300 percent or more when the county sends out its tax notices, scheduled for this August but delayed until at least October.
The cap on reassessment is not a cap on property taxes. The assessed value is only one part of the formula used to determine how much an owner pays on a property in taxes. The rate charged per dollar of value is the other factor.
Bernice Wright, the Beaufort County assessor, has said the cap would shift the tax burden from properties that substantially increased in value to those that did not. County officials have said they will adjust the overall tax rate to make up for the money lost because of the cap. The bill passed through the assembly when Sen. Scott Richardson, R-Hilton Head Island, tacked it onto another tax-related bill. He said most of the Senate supported the cap, but that a few members were preventing it from coming to the floor for a vote by using procedural tricks.
He has said he was responding to a public outcry for property tax relief. The bill could create difficulties for Beaufort County’s government, though, because state law requires counties to reassess property values every five years. The county actually was scheduled for reassessment in 2003, but delayed it a year while considering a local 15 percent cap on property value increases. County Council in April decided not to adopt the 15 percent cap this year.
Because the governor has not signed the bill, county officials still are not certain whether this year’s reassessment will be capped and how they must calculate the notices.
Safay and Heitzke said they fear that if Sanford waits much longer and then signs the legislation, the county might not have enough time to recalculate the tax bills.
“There is just no end to the problems presented by the bill,” Safay said.