Property Taxes from a Local Perspective

by Patricia Wilson
Senior Deputy Auditor
Bannock County, Idaho

Frequently Asked Questions:

• What is a Taxing District?
• Who spends my Property Taxes?
• How many Taxing Districts are there in Bannock County?
• How is a Taxing District's property tax dollar amount determined?
• How is a Taxing District's assessed valuation determined?
• How is a Taxing District's levy determined?
• How is my Property Tax computed?
• How often does my Property Tax change?
• What are the current Property Tax rates in Bannock County?
• How does Bannock County Property Taxes compare to other jurisdictions?
• What are the current Bannock County Code Areas?

What is a Taxing District?

A taxing district is an entity which is authorized by law to levy taxes to provide services to a group of property owners in a particular area.  Idaho code 63-3101 defines a taxing district as any county, any political subdivision of the state, any municipal corporation, including specially chartered cities, any school districts, including specially chartered school districts, any quasi-municipal corporation, or any other public corporation authorized by law to levy taxes. The most well-known taxing districts are school districts, cities, highway districts, cemetery districts and fire protection districts. There are other less-known districts such as ambulance and hospital districts.

In Bannock County, besides the county, there are other taxing districts which include cities, schools, cemeteries, libraries, highways, ambulance, hospital and fire districts. See Bannock County Taxing Districts.

Who spends my Property Taxes?

Bannock County property tax dollars are spent by local units of governments*.  No Bannock County property taxes go to the State or Federal government.  Who receives your tax dollar payment is determined by the code area in which your assessed property is located (See Bannock County Code Area Map).  Your assessment notice as well as your tax bill identifies the appropriate code area and thus the local taxing districts which levy a tax on your property to fund the services they provide.

*Some property tax dollars may go to urban renewal projects if such an agency is created as per Idaho Code.
 

How many Taxing Districts are there in Bannock County?

There are 32 Taxing Districts in Bannock County. One of those districts, Marsh Valley Hospital District, has been inactive and not levied a property tax for several years.  The remaining 31 taxing districts are composed of seven cities, five school districts, seven fire districts, six cemetery districts, two library districts, two highway districts, one county and one county-wide ambulance district.  Six districts are joint taxing districts which means that they have assessed valuation in more than one county.  The levy for these joint districts must be the same in all counties. Any one taxpayer pays only to a subset of these taxing districts (See Bannock County Code Area Map).

How is a Taxing District’s property tax dollar amount determined?

Property taxes are calculated as a residual amount as per Idaho Code.  This means that the taxing district must first determine all available sources of revenues other than property tax (including any uncommitted fund reserves).  This total revenue is then subtracted from the taxing district’s adopted expenditure budget to determine the amount of property tax revenue needed.  The following is an example of how this process worked for one Bannock County taxing district.
 

How is a Taxing District’s assessed valuation determined?

The valuation for a taxing district is the sum of all individually assessed property within its boundaries. Even though Idaho Code states that property is to be appraised at 100% of market value many of the properties are less than full market value because of  certain allowable exemptions such as the homeowners or hardship exemptions.  There are three tax rolls that comprise the total assessed valuation as used to compute the yearly tax levy.  The Regular Roll is the major roll produced by the County assessor’s office.  This contains all county property assessed by the assessor as of January 1st.   Along with this roll is an estimated Sub Roll that is a total assessed valuation estimated by the county assessor for any property not in existence on January 1st but which becomes taxable property sometime later during that calendar year. The third tax roll comes from the State Tax Commission.  For state-wide uniformity purposes,  the State Tax Commission assesses all state public utilities and those values are given to the counties by September 1st on the State Utility Rolls.  The regular and estimated sub rolls are available in July of each year.  As previously mentioned the state utility roll is not available until early September.  The following is an example of one taxing district’s total assessed valuation as used to compute its yearly levy.
 
 

How is a Taxing District’s levy determined?

After the total assessed valuation (excluding any allowable exemptions) for a district, as well as the total property tax dollar request for that taxing district is determined, a tax levy can be computed.  The levy is a nine digit decimal that is computed by dividing the total tax dollar request by the total assessed valuation.  This total levy may be comprised of several allowable individual levies which will sum to the total allowable taxing district levy.  The following is an example of one taxing district’s total levy and the individual levies that comprise the total levy.

Total Levy:
Total Property tax dollars requested        $14,174,286
Assessed Valuation (after exemptions)    $2,583,661,067       = .005486124
 
 

How is my Property Tax computed?

The taxable assessed value of my property (after any homeowners exemption or other applicable exemption) is multiplied by the total levies of all applicable taxing districts in my code area (See Bannock County Code Area Map) to determine the property tax amount due.  The following is an example of the tax computation for a tax payer who lives in the City of Pocatello.

Taxing Districts within Code Area 01 (City of Pocatello):

Assessed Valuation:

Therefore the total property taxes to be paid:        $60,000 x .023729804 = $1,423.79
 

How often do my Property Taxes change?

Property taxes are assessed once a year.  Property tax bills are usually received by the second Monday in November and can be paid in two installments.  One installment of the tax bill is due by December 20th and the second installment is due by June 20th of the following year.  The market value on which your tax bill is computed has been determined as of January 1st.  The tax rate used to compute your property tax bill was set by mid September and verified by the State Tax Commission shortly thereafter.  This rate is a total of each applicable taxing district’s levy as determined from the allowable property tax request as submitted to the County Commission by the first part of September.

What are the current Property Tax rates in Bannock County?

Taxing districts must have their property tax dollar request to the County by the first part of September. These requests are divided by the total assessed valuation for that taxing district to determine a tax or levy rate. Each district usually has more than one levy rate which is then combined for a total taxing district levy rate. See 2005 Bannock County Tax Levies for the current levies. Remember that these total individual taxing district levies are combined with other applicable taxing district levies (as determined by the code area in which the property is located) when determining one's total property tax levy, which is then multiplied by one's individual property tax value to obtain the tax due amount.

How does Bannock County Property Taxes compare to other jurisdictions?

Bannock County's levy rates are sometimes compared to other Idaho counties. The most frequently compared levies are those of residents who reside in the code area containing the county seat. This comparison would parallel a resident in Bannock County's county seat of the City of Pocatello to residents in the City of Idaho Falls (Bonneville County), the City of Caldwell (Canyon County), the City of Coeur d'Alene (Kootenai County), and the City of Twin Falls (Twin Falls County). These counties are used when comparing counties of approximately the same population size. Ada County is also included to compare the activities of Idaho's largest county. The Associated Taxpayers of Idaho annually publishes all State of Idaho Property tax levies.