Democrat leaders say they are disappointed in discussions around property taxes at the legislature. A measure that would set up a study of actual use property valuation and its effect on state revenues died in the Senate last week. Currently, valuations are based on a productivity model. This means if soil on land is rated for cropland it gets taxed as cropland even though it’s being used to graze cattle. Senator Bill Sutton of Burke says an actual use model is more fair because it assesses land for what it’s currently being used. Sutton says the productivity method encourages farmers and ranchers to tear up native grasslands.
"And that’s what this would seek to address is look at what are you actually using the land for. And so our tax structure is incentivizing people and forcing them to make a management decision based on what your tax structure is. And that’s just not a good precedent to set and not good policy to follow," says Sutton.
Opponents to actual use property valuations say the method is more volatile than the productivity method. They say the state could see a decrease of up to 3 billion dollars in property valuations by moving to an actual use method.