Landfill's neighbors want fairer shake
The Canton Repository
PIKE TWP - Here's a picture no Realtor would want a house- shopping client to see: A homeowner wearing a mask while mowing the lawn, the better to blot out the smell from the nearby landfill.
That is an experience Marilyn Stith describes to illustrate the joys of living near the troublesome Countywide landfill in Pike Township. Stith wonders, as she told The Repository for a story Sunday, how her home, to which she says she has made no improvements in 10 years, could increase in value by $41,000 in the most recent reappraisal by the Stark County auditor's office. Stith and 13 other landowners near the landfill want their property taxes lowered.
We assume these property owners understand that home appraisal is an art as well as a science. But Jason Frost, chief appraiser for Auditor Kim Perez, is right when he says, "We're charged with having to support" the numbers that the appraisers come up with. Frost says that when home sales are few, as they apparently are in the landfill's neighborhood, "it's hard to know what would be 'normal' for the area." Point taken - so how were the higher property valuations arrived at? They have to be based on something.
If nothing else, the property owners' appeal to the Board of Revision will shed light on that issue.
One argument in favor of a tax hike might be that the odor problem at Countywide will not go on forever, though that would be small comfort to anyone trying to sell his or her nearby home now. But the argument for the higher valuations - they range from $13,000 to $48,000 - is harder to make when squared with concerns in the auditor's office that the landfill itself might not be taxed enough. Auditor's employees say they are not experts on appraising landfills, so they are calling in someone who is.
Perhaps this expert also can give guidance on how to fairly treat a landfill's neighbors.
PIKE TWP - Here's a picture no Realtor would want a house- shopping client to see: A homeowner wearing a mask while mowing the lawn, the better to blot out the smell from the nearby landfill.
That is an experience Marilyn Stith describes to illustrate the joys of living near the troublesome Countywide landfill in Pike Township. Stith wonders, as she told The Repository for a story Sunday, how her home, to which she says she has made no improvements in 10 years, could increase in value by $41,000 in the most recent reappraisal by the Stark County auditor's office. Stith and 13 other landowners near the landfill want their property taxes lowered.
We assume these property owners understand that home appraisal is an art as well as a science. But Jason Frost, chief appraiser for Auditor Kim Perez, is right when he says, "We're charged with having to support" the numbers that the appraisers come up with. Frost says that when home sales are few, as they apparently are in the landfill's neighborhood, "it's hard to know what would be 'normal' for the area." Point taken - so how were the higher property valuations arrived at? They have to be based on something.
If nothing else, the property owners' appeal to the Board of Revision will shed light on that issue.
One argument in favor of a tax hike might be that the odor problem at Countywide will not go on forever, though that would be small comfort to anyone trying to sell his or her nearby home now. But the argument for the higher valuations - they range from $13,000 to $48,000 - is harder to make when squared with concerns in the auditor's office that the landfill itself might not be taxed enough. Auditor's employees say they are not experts on appraising landfills, so they are calling in someone who is.
Perhaps this expert also can give guidance on how to fairly treat a landfill's neighbors.
