County Commission approves new tax levy

By Rusty Murry

Nevada Daily Mail

On Wednesday, the Vernon County Commis-sion conducted a public hearing and voted unanioursly to raise the county tax levy from 0.1638 to 0.1653 per $100 assessed valuation.

During the brief hearing, held in the commission's office on the second floor office of the Vernon County Courthouse, County Clerk Tammi Beach told commissioners "current valuation is up" so I am proposing our levy be raised. We're going up very, very slightly," Beach said.

Beach told the commission that the valuation of real estate, railroad and utility and personal property in the county was $235,239,388 for the 2012 tax year, representing an increase over last year's valuation, which was $231,259,014.

Last year's valuation brought $378,802.26 into the county coffers; and that, coupled with the increased levy, should bring in $388,850.70, Beach said, "if everybody pays their taxes."

Beach also said that the county's sales tax revenue is slightly higher than it was as this time last year.

Real estate makes up the largest portion of the property values. A total of $159,411,020 is assigned to the residential, agricultural, commercial and local railroad and utilities real estate holdings in the county. Personal property, countywide, is valued at $59,326,332 and the state assessed valuation of railroad /utility real estate and personal property is $19,502,036.