Antelope County Assessor Kelly Mueller announced new valuation figures last week.
Done every August, the valuations are used to help with the tax process by which tax levies are determined for tax subdivisions.
Antelope County’s valuation was set at $2,483,485,076, the figure is up from one year ago when the valuation was $2,459,406,353.
Closer to home, Elgin’s valuation was set at just over $38.9 million, up by more than $4 million from one year ago.
School District #18 figures
District #18 Superintendent Dan Polk may want to consider a career in real estate valuation when he steps away from school administration.
Reviewing 2019 tax valuations for the school district, he shared his thoughts in an exclusive to The Elgin Review.
“As predicted valuations have ground to a halt in the area. Which they should have after their incredible explosion in the last eight years,” Polk indicated. “The property tax problem is undeniable BUT the system for figuring property taxes proves itself accurate once again, though maybe a little on the slow side.
“The biggest jump in valuations came a couple of years after $13 per bushel soybeans and $8 corn. When land prices were high and people were paying them. As commodity prices have dropped and come way back down, so has the measured value of the land. Though not as rapidly as most would like.”
The Elgin Review collected 2019 valuation figures for School District #18 which is composed of land in Antelope, Boone and Wheeler Counties. The numbers break down as follows:
Antelope County — The 2019 valuation was set at $632,666,729. That is up slightly from one year ago when the 2018 valuation was $631,043,838.
Boone County — According to the Boone County Assessor’s office, the 2019 valuation is $48,458,863, down from the 2018 valuation of $48,645,317.
Wheeler County — The 2019 valuation was set at $19,084,593, up slightly from one year ago when the 2018 valuation was $18,908,422.
The school district’s 2019 valuation, when adding figures from the three counties, comes in at just over $700.2 million. The figure is up slightly from one year ago when the district’s 2018 valuation was $698,597,577. “Antelope valuation went up just point zero two percent, in Wheeler County it went up just one percent and in Boone County it is in the negative percent range when compared to last year. Thankfully with a frugal spending board of education, that values conservative policy while at the same time allowing the staff and district to be progressive in technology and facilities, along with continued tax revenue from the wind farms, preliminary estimates looks like District 18 will again ask less in taxes than we did the year before for a 6th year in a row,” Polk said.
“In 2014-15 the district asked for approximately $2.9 million and this year, with lots of pencil to paper yet to be done, it looks like we will be asking for approx. $2.0-2.2 million.”
