By Jennifer Jacob Brown / staff writer
Lauderdale County taxpayers may be getting a break next year — a 2.7 percent ad valorem tax break, to be exact.
The county board of supervisors has proposed a tax decrease for the next fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1, because two debts have been paid off in this fiscal year's budget, according to County Administrator Mike Sumrall.
That means taxpayers will be paying a bit less on their homes, car tags, rental real property, and other taxable property.
This year, Sumrall said, the county was able to pay off a $6.5 million bond issue taken out for road and courthouse improvements in 1989 and a roughly $1 million bank loan taken out to fund repairs after Hurricane Katrina.
Because those debts have been paid off, the county plans to take a decrease of $673,117, or 2.7 percent, in the ad valorem tax rate for FY2009/2010. This year's total ad valorem revenue was $24,968,280. The proposed total ad valorem revenue for the coming fiscal year is $24,295,163.
The board will hold a public hearing on the decrease in the ad valorem tax rate on Tuesday, Sept. 10 in the board room of the Raymond P. Davis County Annex Building on 21st Avenue.
