By Dave Baumeister
County Correspondent
SIOUX FALLS – The Minnehaha County Director of Equalization Chris Lilla went through several trends his office has seen over the past year during this week’s county commission meeting.
While many people are seeing their tax bills go up, he pointed out that it is not his office that sets the tax, but, instead, determines the value of any property in the county.
Lilla explained that valuation is set based on a variety of different factors, but two of the biggest deal with improvements made and what neighboring properties sell for.
If property has a higher valuation, that means that, when sold, the Office of Equalization has found that the property will be worth more.
Even then, when property is “equalized,” the amount that office comes up with only represents 90 to 94% of its total worth, according to Lilla.
And, despite complaints, Lilla’s must be doing something right, as he said that currently there were only five people contesting their property’s valuation (valuation notices were sent out last month).
Commission chair Dean Karsky said that some years he has had to sit through hundreds of assessment complaints as part of the Board of Equalization.
Lilla said that when people have complaints, the first stop is usually to his office, and people in the office go into detail about how assessment are arrived at, and they that they look at a variety of aspects about the property.
After that, he said, people usually go away satisfied and with more knowledge.
In some of the charts he had. Lilla showed that while the number of building permits in the county has remained about the same for years, the income from those permits has risen greatly since 2021, due to much larger building projects happening, such as Amazon, apartment buildings, and other major office buildings.
In 2023, Lilla said, there were 8,000 building permits issued in the county.
Also in 2023, there were a total of 6,170 property transfers, which was down from 8,000 transfers in 2022.
During 2023, the equalization office re-assessed five neighborhoods in Sioux Falls, two in smaller county towns, and four townships.
Lilla explained that the constant re-appraising of neighborhoods is an ongoing pat of the job to keep up with building permits. Whenever a building permit is issued, the property tied to that permit eventually has to be re-assessed.
The next county commission meeting will be at 9 a.m., Tuesday, March 19 on the third floor of the Minnehaha County Administration Building.
