The protest must be filed to the County Clerk’s office in the month of June. It can be emailed to protest@scottsbluffcounty.gov, faxed to 308-436-3178, hand delivered, mailed to 1825 10th Street, Gering, NE 69341 or dropped in the drop box on the South side of the Administration Building. It MUST be turned in prior to June 30th. If the protest is submitted July 1st or after, it will not be considered.

The statute states that no matter what level the protest is filed, the burden of proof is on the filer to show why the value does not reflect current market value. This can be accomplished by having comparable properties and proving that the valuations are not equalized. The Scotts Bluff County Board of Equalization have also allowed recent arm’s length sales and qualified appraisals to prove current market value.

There are two types of appraisal; Fee and Mass appraisal. Most people are familiar with fee appraisal. That is where an appraiser will take a few sales, adjust the comparable properties and adjust for differences like year built or a garage. The appraiser is able to choose which sales they want to use, in whichever time frame they choose and can make any adjustment they want. Mass appraisal is used for ad valorem tax assessment. Mass appraisal is different in that the appraiser must use every sale within a certain time frame. They cannot make any adjustments to any properties. They also use sales that have occurred in the past as we follow the market, we do not set it.

Data collectors go out into the field to collect all of the data characteristics of every single property. Sometimes limited data is collected if access to a building or property is restricted. They determine the year built, measure the structures and note all amenities. These amenities can include: basement, basement finish, garages, decks, yard sheds, fireplace, over height walls. Back in the office, the data collectors will research the size of the land that each parcel encompassed using available plat maps and maps from the Mapping Department. All of this information is entered into a CAMA (computer aided mass appraisal) system that helps price out the property. The system uses a valuation service called Marshall and Swift. Marshall and Swift is a nationally recognized valuation service that researches prices in the current market for each amenity of the property like the price of lumber, roofing materials, concrete or any other building material. This is called Replacement Cost New (RCN) and it determines the price of the structures as if it were built today. Marshall and Swift also have depreciation tables that allow the property to depreciate on factors like age, condition and quality. This is called Replacement Cost New Less Depreciation (RCNLD). This value is the starting point. Next, market areas are determined. A market area or neighborhood is not just a person’s block that they live on, it can encompass several blocks or areas and will be determined by looking at how houses sell in an area. Are all of the homes similar? Are they near a school or shopping area that affects the way the property would be sold? Statistics are researched in a two or three year sales period that shows whether that market area is going up in value, going down in value or if it is stable. If a neighborhood requires an adjustment based on those statistics, a change is made to all properties in that neighborhood, not just the ones that have sold.

The assessor’s office uses the median to determine a level of value but other statistics are used to ensure that the median is a meaningful number. Statistics such as the COD (coefficient of dispersion), PRD (price related differential) and weighted mean are used to make sure that the median didn’t just “get lucky” and fall into compliance. For residential properties, the median needs to be at 100% of market per statute. This is done using all sales that occurred within a two year period. Statute provides a range of 92% to 100% to be in compliance. For commercial, the median needs to be 100% with that same range but uses three years’ worth of sales. Agricultural land also uses three years’ worth of sales but the median needs to be at 75% with a range of 69% to 75%. Each year that the assessor sets values, two to three years of sales that occurred in the past were used. If something was currently happening in the market to potentially affect sales, it wouldn’t enter the sales data for at least a year to be considered.

The assessor must look at all three classes of land (Residential, Commercial and Agriculture) every year as of January 1st to reanalyze all data. If a change needs to happen in a neighborhood, it can happen in two different ways. A full reappraisal could have been performed where a data collector physically visited the property to make updates from the last physical visit. New depreciation tables would be established, and then statistics would be run on the entire neighborhood to correctly update the value of that market area. If an area cannot be physically inspected but the statistics are out of compliance, a percent adjustment is applied to the neighborhood to get it into compliance. It is applied consistently to every property in that market area and is typically applied to structures only as the land is set using a separate valuation. The only other way a property would have a valuation change is if a building permit adjusted the value or if Pictometry (aerial imagery) caught a change that needed adjusted.

Just because you have not made any changes or updates on your property from prior years does not mean your value will not change. There are several other factors that affect valuation. Sales studies of buildings such as outbuildings may have caused new depreciation tables to be updated and cause changes in valuation. Marshall and Swift costs could have been updated which directly affects the replacement cost new (RCN). Sales coming in may indicate the market is increasing which affects all properties in a market area.

People put money into investments in the hope that their investment will appreciate in value. Properties are no different; this is why values are always changing. Most people do not understand the way the tax system works so they automatically associate a raise in value as a negative thing. Many protests are heard each year with the idea that they believe the value is where it should be, but they don’t want to pay any more in taxes. Believe it or not, we receive protest every year to RAISE values as well. Those properties owners are typically trying to sell or refinance and they want their investment to reflect the most current value.

Many people are unaware of how their taxes are determined. They believe that the assessor’s office is in control of taxes. This is untrue. Our value is one piece of a formula that levying entities use to determine their tax asking. As a matter of fact, if the values go up and those levying entities do not ask for any more money than they did the year before, the taxes should go down. If the levy stays the same or goes up, that means the levying entity is asking for more money in the current year. For example, if a local school district needs $500,000 and the all of the value from our office in their school district adds up to $65,000,000 their levy would be .007692. ($500,000 divided by $65,000,000 is .007692). If your home was valued at $100,000 your tax bill for the school would be $769.20. (100,000 x .007692) If the following year the values raised in the school district to $70,000,000 but the school was still only asking for $500,000 the tax bill would be $714.30. ($500,000 divided by $70,000,000 is .0071430). This would be a $55 decrease in taxes even though values went up. The only way to protest your taxes is to go to the budget hearings in September of those levying entities increasing their budgets.

Scotts Bluff County
School Districts such as Gering, Scottsbluff, Mitchell, Morrill, Minatare and Bayard
Cemetery Districts
Fire Districts
Towns such as Scottsbluff, Gering, Mitchell, Morrill, Henry, Lyman, Terrytown, Minatare, Melbeta and McGrew
Western Nebraska Community College
Sanitary Improvement Districts
Parking Districts
Drainage Districts
ESU 13
Airport