Taxpayers In Missoula County Face Changes In Property Bills

Missoula, MT (KGVO-AM News) - I spoke this week with Chris Lounsbury, Missoula County’s Chief Administrative Officer, about the impact of the new county budget on the average property taxpayer.

Lounsbury began his report with a look at ‘one-time’ requests for funding.

The Missoula County Budget is Out, and it Includes $2.9 Million in New Spending

“I'll start with the number of one-time requests,” began Lounsbury. “These are (requests) that are not funded by increasing property taxes, but are to do things like replace equipment, or to work on long-range planning, and those kinds of things. This year, the county has about a new $2.9 million, roughly, in spending in that one-time category for kind of non-budget or non-property tax, impactful kind of spending.”

Lounsbury detailed the spending requests that will impact Missoula County property taxpayers.

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Lounsbury Detailed Some of the Programs to be Funded

“That includes ongoing tax support for the crime victims advocate program, which provides direct services to victims of crimes as their courts move through the cases, and includes some increases to the county attorney’s program for our county attorney's office for diversionary programs, and some additional investments in our Community Health Department, and that total this year for new property tax requests is $659,976.”

Realistically, Lounsbury said the average increase in property taxes for county homeowners will be about eight percent this year.

The Average County Property Tax Increase will be about 8 Percent

“So what that means for folks, I think, is the thing that's most important, and really what it comes down to is, in order to sustain the current level of services and add those new things on, it will be about an 8 percent property tax increase in the total amount that the county collects in property taxes,” he said. “That doesn't translate to an 8 percent increase to individual property tax owners. But that's just the net total between increases in salaries, increases in the goods and items that we have to buy, and what we will need for additional property tax revenue.”

Lounsbury said there will be a small decrease in county property taxes for the average homeowner.

He said There Could be a Slight Decrease in your Property Tax Bill

“If they live in the city of Missoula, as a city taxpayer, about $75 less than they paid last year for those services, even though we're collecting more money,” he said. “In addition, if you live in the county, about $151 annual decrease in what you will be paying for that $507,000 median home in Missoula County because of those legislative changes.”

Click here to see the full Missoula County Budget for the upcoming fiscal year.