Property Tax Changes 2008
   Action of the 2008 General Assembly
 The much-amended Senate Bill 711 was finally passed on May 16, the last day of the session. It is complex legislation and opinion is divided on what the effect will be.

Local school property taxes are the largest single source of funding for Missouri’s public schools, and any proposal that affects the setting of tax rates and the collection of property taxes has a significant impact on public schools. The reassessment process is a rough estimate of the true property value of each property which generally increases incrementally every year, just like the cost to educate a child.

CCS/HCS/SS/SCS/SB 711 seeks to force school districts and other local governments to roll their tax rate back, upon reassessment, against the current tax rate, even if the district has previously approved a higher tax rate that is often called a “tax rate ceiling.” The change will limit growth in local revenues when reassessment causes significant increases in property values.

The bill makes changes to our circuit breaker tax credit program and to the homestead preservation tax credit. It makes significant changes to rollback provisions, and adjusts the assessment calendar. There was no effort to address some of the most serious problems with the property tax, such as the way agricultural land is assessed. See the MTJ Report on Missouri Property Tax for a review of other problems Click here for the summary and final text of the bill.

2008 Legislative Issues

Evaluation of the Issues with Missourians for Tax Justice Principles


1.  Though the property tax is imperfect, it provides some $6 billion in annual revenue for our public schools, public safety and other services by local governments. It is not politically possible now to replace these dollars with some other revenue source(s).

It is important to prevent destructive changes to this essential source of income for our public schools and local governments by those unaware or uncaring of the consequences.



2. Local taxing jurisdictions have the right to collect the property taxes that their voters have approved. However, significant increases in the assessed value sometimes result in actual tax charges that are higher than voters reasonably expected when voting for the tax rates (which they measured against the assessed value of their property at the time they were voting). Thus it is legitimate for the state legislature to enact new laws that address this unintended confusion of the voters.

MTJ may support measures that limit actual property tax charges to what voters would have anticipated at the time they approved the levy, provided that such measures provide means for the local jurisdiction to seek voter approval for additional revenue.



3. Our commitment to tax fairness compels us to oppose measures that would require taxpayers with identical properties in the same taxing jurisdiction to pay different property tax charges based on how long they had owned the property.



4. MTJ will support improvements in the circuit breaker that decrease the regressive impact of the property tax on those least able to pay.



5.  MTJ will support a requirement for a Certificate of Value for every Missouri county to aid assessors in making accurate assessments and aid the State Tax Commission in measuring local compliance.



6. MTJ will oppose any restrictive “cap” or “freeze” on property tax rates.



7.  MTJ will oppose any proposal to eliminate the property tax and replace it with a sales tax.



8. MTJ will support proposals that require counties to accept quarterly property tax payments and proposals that improve notification and appeal procedures.

Click Here for the 2008 MTJ Report on Missouri Property Tax

Click Here for the MTJ Report on the Circuit Breaker Property Tax Credit


Last Update 6/7/08

Back to MTJ Home Page