Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

Special session of Legislature is sought to cap property taxes

Three Republican lawmakers have asked Gov. Kenny Guinn to call a special legislative session this year to implement a cap on property taxes.

Sen. Ann O'Connell, R-Las Vegas, Assembly Minority Leader Lynn Hettrick, R-Gardnerville, and Assemblyman David Brown, R-Henderson, said Monday that the issue of rising property taxes needs to be addressed before the 2005 legislative session.

"I think it's a service to the people to get in there and discuss it and have it finalized," O'Connell said.

Guinn said he has not seen the letter asking for a special session. "No one has talked to me." He said he has no idea what the letter writers want but will talk to his chief of staff, Michael Hillerby, today.

He said he wonders if this issue can be addressed by the regular session of the Legislature that meets in February, before the property tax bills go out next year.

He said he wants to talk to Clark County Assessor Mark Schofield to get a handle on the situation. And he doesn't know if the 6 percent cap being proposed is the best choice.

The 6 percent cap was proposed by Schofield last week when he told the Clark County Commission that the state faces a rebellion by taxpayers likely to face giant property tax increases. Schofield warned that Las Vegas Valley residents could see a 50 percent increase in their property taxes next July because of skyrocketing home values. He also warned that in order to provide relief, a cap needed to be in place by March.

Already several legislators, including O'Connell, have signed on to Schofield's proposal.

On Monday, Schofield called the proposal for a special session a "fabulous idea."

"It would mitigate the problem before it even gets started," said Schofield, who said he "about fell off my seat" when O'Connell told him she was proposing a special session.

While other legislators have expressed support for a property tax cap, several said they were surprised to learn of O'Connell's proposal for a special session.

Assembly Speaker Richard Perkins, D-Henderson, who has supported a tax cap, was in Boston Monday for the Democratic National Convention and said he'll "have to look into it and respond."

Senate Majority Leader Bill Raggio, R-Reno, who is in Seattle attending a legislative convention, also said he had not heard of the call for a special session.

The Legislature is scheduled to meet for its regular session in February, but O'Connell said she is concerned that lawmakers could be swamped with another tax crisis when they return to Carson City.

It appears that a referendum to repeal the $833 million in taxes passed last year by the Legislature could be put on the November ballot. Should voters overturn those taxes, legislators would first have to determine how to make up for that lost revenue, she said.

"If they're repealed, we start right where we left off with the last session, which is a huge debate on taxes again," O'Connell said.

A property tax cap could get lost in that debate, and local governments need to know by March, when they formulate their budgets, whether property taxes will be capped, she said.

"It would be unfortunate if local governments began to budget with exorbitant incomes and the Legislature enacted something that would curtail that," Brown said.

The assessor's office plans on sending out cards telling homeowners of their property values in late December. Unless a cap is in place, Schofield said he expects "an avalanche of appeals" that will cripple his office.

With a cap, the number of appeals will be limited, he predicted.

A special session also would give the Legislature time to fix any problems that arise before March, he said.

After March, Schofield said, it becomes impossible for Nevada's rural governments to prepare the revised property tax bills.

"If there is something wrong and it needs to be tweaked somehow, it could be done early in the next session," he said.

Schofield said he has not yet spoken to Guinn or his representatives on the issue, but intends to.

"I would strongly urge him to consider this," Schofield said. "I believe that if he does, he will be pleasantly surprised by the amount of bipartisan support this receives."

Among those that have publicly embraced the 6 percent cap are O'Connell; Sen. Terry Care, D-Las Vegas; Hettrick; Assemblywoman Valerie Weber, R-Las Vegas; Senate Minority Leader Dina Titus, D-Las Vegas, and Perkins.

Hettrick said he's getting calls from people saying that the expected tax increases, ranging from 30 to 50 percent in Clark and Washoe County, are going to force people out of their homes.

"The increases are huge," he said. "We're getting calls constantly from people who say they can't come up with this. We have to correct this."

Guinn called a special session in June 2001 when the Legislature could not complete a plan for reapportionment and failed to pass a number of other bills by the 120-day legal limit of the regular session.

In July 2002, the governor convened a special session to deal with the medical malpractice problems. He then called two special sessions after the 2003 regular session for the lawmakers to pass a tax-increase package.

Hettrick said the cost of a special session for a few days would be less than the cost of refunding the taxes if the Legislature waits until 2005 to act on a tax limitation.

He said he hopes to have all the Republican Assemblymen behind the issue.

"The idea is not to say we're proposing this and leaving with governor between a rock and a hard place," Hettrick said. "We want to work with the governor. He's just as concerned with people's property tax as we are."

The GOP leader said the county assessors in Clark and Washoe counties revalue the property every year. And these are the areas where the property values are going up. In many of the rural counties, the assessed value goes up only slightly every year until they are reappraised on a five-year schedule.

"This needs to be soon. People are getting their tax bills now," said Hettrick. "We're starting to get phone calls saying they will not be able to stay in their homes. That is just not right."

He said the people at Incline Village at Lake Tahoe are being hit hard. He said the property values are skyrocketing so that only the U.S. Forest Service will be able to buy the land and take it off the tax rolls.

Brown is not running for re-election and Hettrick faces no major opponent. But O'Connell is locked in high profile Republican primary with physician Joe Heck.

Heck already sent a mail piece to constituents in the district criticizing O'Connell for supporting the 6 percent cap, saying it should be lower. He also said Monday that the idea of a special session is "absurd."

Heck favors capping property taxes at the federal Cost of Living Adjustment, which he said has average 2.5 percent in the past ten years.

O'Connell said she wants to set the cap at 6 percent with hopes it could be reduced to 4 percent or less. But property taxes do cover school bonds and other government debts that the state can not bow out of, she said.

"This is going to take quite a bit of doing," she said. "It's going to take discussion because property taxes for the most part are made up of things that the people have already voted on."

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