Washington County auditor says he suspects end of fiscal fill-in | KCII Radio

Refunds to county and city governments for commercial property tax cuts will be phased out over the next several years as part of the tax plan that the Iowa legislature passed this year.

These refunds, otherwise known as “fill”, were enacted as part of a 2013 law and have been treated by local governments as property tax revenue. The payments will be phased out over the next four to seven years, depending on the growth of the tax base. Washington County Auditor Dan Widmer said he and the supervisory board had not determined how many dollars lost it would mean for the county, but he and other county officials across the state suspected it was only a matter of time. It came as a surprise because there was this feeling or this opinion that people suspected it would happen at some point, just based on past experience with these kinds of things the state is proposing. So I can’t really say it was a big surprise, it was expected that at some point this backfill would be abandoned and unfortunately for the counties this is what will happen.

Washington City Administrator Brent Hinson told KCII he estimates ending the backfill would amount to about $ 100,000 in reduction in the city’s budget. Other features of the state’s tax plan included a shift in mental health funding from local property taxes to a state credit, the elimination of income tax cut triggers that would speed up cuts initially enacted. in 2018 and the expansion of child tax credits.