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Friday, August 8, 2014

What does the county assessor do??


When I was appointed to the Salt Lake County Council in January of this year, I made a goal to visit with every elected official holding a county office. I have met many fantastic leaders and hard-working county employees who are driven and focused on providing great customer service to residents. Among those elected officials is the county assessor, Kevin Jacobs. Here are some of the things he and his staff does:
  • Lists and maintains records on each piece of taxable "real" and "personal property" in Salt Lake County. (Real Property includes land and buildings. Personal Property includes business furniture and fixtures, business equipment, construction equipment, and manufactured homes.)
  • Responsible for the equitable and fair assessment of all properties in Salt Lake County. Individual real property parcels now number over 350,000 and cover an area of 737 square miles with a market value over $120 billion. There are over 90,000 personal property accounts valued over $5.2billion. These records are all public. Access to these records, excluding motor vehicle private records, is available online and at the office at 2001 South State Street N2300.
  • Determines fair market value for residential, commercial, and other taxable property in Salt Lake County. Fair market value of real property may go up or down depending on the real estate market in the county. Personal Property is valued based on schedules developed by the Tax Commission.
The office has recently been reorganized to better serve the taxpayers. An appeal division was eliminated and appraisers assigned appeals within the geographic area they work. This will better coordinate all types of work for a given area whether new construction, reappraisal, or appeals and taxpayers will better interface with a specific individual. Additionally, they have implemented new regression modeling software, are organizing phone mediation conferences for appeals at the State Tax Commission level, and are in the process of implementing an integrated tax system countywide.

They are the most diverse and yet best performing assessment jurisdiction in the State. They maintain an office of licensed and certified appraisers current in mass-appraisal practices and have received local and national recognition for the assessment work they accomplish.

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