Mississippi casinos likely to sue Harrison County over tax rolls

Tuesday, Sept. 19, 2000 | 9:01 a.m.

The casinos believe the county overvalued their hotels and land for property taxes by more than $350 million, which would force them top pay more than $5 million more to the county, cities and schools.

Supervisors adopted the new property tax roll on Monday.

Casino operators said the increased taxes could further erode their profitability and threaten the industry's livelihood.

"That's how Houston, Texas, and other areas got themselves in trouble in the 1980s," said Bernie Burkholder, president of Treasure Bay casino. "They had city and county budgets based on unrealistic property values and were building new schools down the street based on the values. When the businesses couldn't make it and couldn't pay the taxes, they had all these properties being sold at tax sale."

Supervisors said the higher levies results from a reappraisal of property values. They said citizens could bear the brunt of higher taxes if casinos do get their appraisals lowered.

"We think our appraisals are fair, and that they will hold up in court," said Bobby Eleuterius, president of the Board of Supervisors.

The casinos themselves are taxed as personal property because they're on barges and not subject to property taxes like land-based hotels.

In some past litigation over tax bills, courts have held the taxes in escrow until the cases were resolved. This could affect county, school and city budgets, which have already been set based on the casino reappraisals.

"But we have a year to get this resolved before taxes are due," Eleuterius said.

Bruce Nourse, a spokesman for Beau Rivage casino, said last week that a lawsuit is one option for his casino.

Beau Rivage believes the appraisal for its hotel should be $252 million, instead of the county's $439 million figure.