Tax Petition

Local Rancher Wants Reform

By Vida Volkert
Staff Reporter

Sheridan rancher Bill Doenz on Wednesday told a group of local leaders at a candidate forum at the Senior Citizens Center that he is circulating a petition to reform the property tax appraisal system.

“The goal will be to move to the acquisition method,” he told the audience. Those present included six candidates running for city and county offices, two City Council members and Mayor Dave Kinskey.

“I don't think you need to circulate a petition, Bill,” Kinskey told Doenz. “I think we have an excellent Legislature. I believe every member of our delegation shares the concern. I think there will be some … tax relief in the Legislature this year.”

Doenz said he has talked to a couple of legislators, but none has proposed changing the tax appraisal system, and no legislator has introduced a bill to address the problem.

He said District 22 state Sen. John Schiffer’s answer for those who don't want to pay taxes is to move to another state, and quoting an article published this month by the Casper Star- Tribune, Doenz said District 28 state Sen. Kit Jennings suggested lowering the mill levy.

“I say, if they lower the mills, they lose their matching grant money,” Doenz said. He added that another idea suggested was to lower property taxes of people age 60 or older who have lived in the state for a number of years and have owned a house for a decade.

“What does that do for somebody who is just trying to keep his home? What does that do for young people? It does nothing,” Doenz said. “This is no longer a Sheridan-Jackson problem. It’s a problem all over the state.”

Doenz said under the current property tax appraisal method, when a developer builds and sells an expensive house next to an average home, the value of the second house rises every time the expensive home is sold, along with the tax on the property.

That's a big problem, he said, for those who do not plan to sell or move out of Sheridan and fear being “taxed out” of their homes.

“When something is overvalued, then it means is vastly overtaxed,” he stated. “Without caps, property taxes will continue to rise uncontrollably as property values increase.”

Ward 1 City Councilor Kathy Kennedy said: “I didn't know every time my neighbor’s house sells, my house goes up.”

She later told The Sheridan Press that, as City Council members, “there’s nothing we can do about it, but we can talk to our legislators.”

She added she supports Doenz’s petition and thinks “it is a good idea that he is getting people informed.” County commissioner candidate Vicki Taylor told The Press legislators have the power to “basically turn to an acquisition method. They can certainly go back to a cost less depreciation.”Taylor said cost less depreciation is a very simple formula, and “that's what it was in Wyoming before market adjustment in 1988. And that is simply, what does your house cost to build today? Given what it is.

“Let’s say today construction cost is $200,000. Let’s say the house is 50 years old. A $200,000 house, if it were to cost that to build today, but it is 50 years old, it's probably worth $80,000.”

Taylor said the system is used in other states. The problem for Wyoming, she said, is that “we still have low-income wage earners and fixed-income people. And we are not a state that sees a great influx of people who are in a higher wage-earning capacity.”

Taylor said county commissioners can listen to individual appraisal complaints and have the power to reverse those appraisals, but most people don't protest their taxes because it is a complicated process, and if the protester is denied, then he must go to other levels, as it is the case with Doenz.

“We live on a ranch,” Doenz told The Press. “We don't have a paved road out there. We don't have city water. Zone restrictions say we can’t sell below 35 acres. We can't sell a two-acre lot.

“But ... when appraising our land, they compared us to the new subdivision in Big Horn, where the lots sold for $40,000 an acre. Two-acre lots were $80,000. I say some comparison.”

Doenz said his ranch is located west of Big Horn and he and his family own about 2,000 acres, but they are overpaying for one residential acre where his family has three old houses. He said the state Board of Equalization rejected his appraisal challenge.

As a result, he formed the Equality State Taxpayers Association, a nonprofit organization that represents the residential taxpayer to try “to save people from being taxed out of their homes,” he said.

“Wyoming is listed as No. 1 in all states with the biggest increase in per capita property tax 1996 to 2002 at an increase of 36.4 percent,” Doenz complained, adding that he will continue to circulate the petition in hopes to see change.

“Dave [Kinskey] says not to do this, but he does not say what we should do to change this,” Doenz
stated.