From the LaPorte Herald-Argus:
La Porte County taxpayers who don't want to pay all their 2013 property taxes in one lump sum this November can still pay early.
They just have to estimate the amount.
According to La Porte County Treasurer Nancy Hawkins, county residents will be receiving their first real property tax bill since 2005 in November. But the catch is they won't be getting a bill earlier this year, as in previous years, meaning they will have to pay the entire year's worth of property taxes all at once.
For residents who want to pay the May portion of their taxes now, she said they can send a check to her office, and her staff will put it toward their future bill. But her department won't be able to give them their actual bill or even the amount they owe because the exemptions and rates haven't even been calculated yet.
Since 2005, La Porte County has been in the throes of a property tax situation that has required the county to send out provisional bills based on outdated assessed valuations. The provisional bills, like the real tax bills before them, were sent out twice a year.
The county has been trying to catch up by sending out reconciled bills, which have been updating taxpayers on the amount they owe based on each year of provisional bills.
As Hawkins explained it, the state is allowing La Porte County to get out of the provisional bill cycle and back to real tax bills this year, but first it has to finish sending out the reconciliations, the last of which, for the 2011-pay-2012 tax year, are being completed now.
For those who wonder why the county can't get the real tax bills out earlier, Hawkins said the reconciled bills have to be calculated first, as required by state law. Then the auditor's and assessor's offices have to gather the new assessed valuations and the various exemptions. Then the county has to wait to get the tax rate from the state. And then the treasurer's office can print the bills.
So it is not as simple as it might seem.
She also wanted to remind taxpayers who haven't paid the reconciliation bills from January, that they are due on July 15.
http://www.heraldargus.com/articles/2013/06/21/news/local/doc51c391ea20efc805350057.txt
