St. Lawrence Township
Scott County
Minnesota
April
20, 2009
St.
Lawrence Township
Pledge
of allegiance was recited.
The
board of appeal and equalization meeting was called to order by Ted Kornder on
April 20, 2009 at 7 p.m.
Board
statement was read by Ted Kornder (insert statement).
Leo
Anderly, our assessor, and Tom Wermerskirchen from Scott County Taxation
Department were present to talk with residents about their real estate taxes.
Jim
Stang was present to talk about his value. No
decision was required by the board. No changes were made.
RaeAnn
Bohlman was present to talk about her tax value.
Leo needs to go to the county and look at sales.
He stated that the last time he was at the Bohlman’s was 2002.
No decision was made.
John
Marks was present to ask why his valuation went down $300,000+.
It was due to a split and sale of land.
John also asked about fixing storm damage and it increasing his value
because he has to get a building permit. He
was told that general maintenance is not considered an improvement and would not
increase the value. Leo is going to
check on some values for John and get back to him.
No decision was made.
Jim
Larson was present to talk about his tax value.
Stated that his place was just appraised by CountryWide for $450,000 and
his neighbor’s home just sold for $485,000.
Jim
brought a copy of the appraisal but because it is a recent appraisal it will not
count for this year’s value and next year’s estimated value did go down.
Leo stated that he can check on the values and get back to him.
No decision was made.
Loren
and Marianne Kerkow were present to talk about why the values have increased on
their real estate after the split of the property.
She also wanted to know how the ag preserve works in comparison to green
acres. Tom stated that as far as he
knows they are valued the same. Marianne
stated that the state did change this and Marianne wants to know how there’s
is assessed compared to other areas in the state.
The state told the county how to value the property and pretty much is
valued the same as green acres. Tom
also stated the state comes up with the green acres value.
Marianne stated that there are different classes of land and the value
should be based on the class of land you have.
She also wanted to know why the values have gone up so much since 2006.
Leo stated that the value of farmland has doubled in the last five years.
Right now ag land is selling for $5,000 to $6,500 an acre compared to
$2,500 five years ago. They wanted
to know how they are coming up with this value.
Tom Wermerskirchen stated that if the land is in ag preserve, they are
getting the low value of the land any way. Leo
stated that they do not go by classifications any more.
It’s either tillable or not tillable.
Marianne stated that this is not right.
Leo will check into the ag preserve value and get back to the Kerkow’s.
No decision was made.
Ed
Chapman was present to talk about why his valuation continues to go up 15% each
year like clockwork. He showed
statistics that showed homes that sold for $176 per sq. ft. and his is at $204
per sq. ft. Leo stated that the
homes that sold were sold at what the value was assessed at or above.
His value for next year is only going down by about $1,000 or a little
more and he knows it has gone down more than that.
Leo asked Ed what he should do. Ed
stated that he wants to know how he should do.
Leo asked if he should lower his home $10,000-$20,000 and then not
lowering the rest of Sioux Vista’s values.
Leo stated that he would look at the sales and let him know what he could
do. No decision was made.
Jim
Stang asked if he could ask another question. Stated
that he has been talking square footage, location and style.
Jim was comparing his home compared to the home that his son bought done
the street. Leo stated that the site
is the main value. Jim stated that
they are only 300 ft. apart and the only difference is that there is someone
between them. Jim does not think his
house should be valued as much as they are basically both the same except square
ft. Leo stated that the pre-fab home
that his son lives in does not come in valued as much as a stick built home.
Next
meeting will be May 5, 2009 at 6 p.m. to discuss the above items.
No
further business to come before the meeting.
Motion by Les and seconded by Ted to recess meeting to May 5, 2009 .
Meeting recessed at 8:25 p.m.