The City of Alpharetta will significantly reduce the millage rate it applies to property taxes in Fiscal Year 2009 to 5.750 mills, a reduction of 0.498 mills from the City’s 2008 rate.
In spite of the reduction, the City will be required to advertise a property tax increase. Georgia law requires the City to compute a “rollback millage rate” that would produce the same total revenue after reassessments as had been received from property taxes in the previous Fiscal Year. Due to projected reassessments, the City’s millage rate for Fiscal Year 2009 will increase property tax revenues by 7.06% over the rollback rate, so by law a tax increase must be advertised.
The projected tax digest for Fiscal Year 2009 reflects historically large reassessments of the value of commercial properties by the Fulton County Tax Assessor. It is anticipated that many of these reassessments will be challenged or litigated. The outcome of those challenges could significantly reduce the tax digest.
The City must adopt its annual millage rate by June 30; well before the resolution of any assessment challenges. To mitigate this issue, the City is not adopting the rollback millage rate. This action ensures that should material portions of the reassessments be reduced, the City can continue to provide the services its citizenry and businesses deserve while still providing for a millage rate reduction.
The City of Alpharetta will hold three public hearings to hear and consider citizen comments regarding the proposed FY 2009 millage rate. These hearings will be held at Alpharetta City Hall, located at 2 South Main Street, on the following dates and times:
Thursday, June 12 at 11:30 AM
Thursday, June 12 at 6:30 PM
Thursday, June 19 at 7:30 PM
Labels: Alpharetta, millage rate, property tax, reduction
