Feb. 21, 1980

REASSESSMENT OPTIONS FACE SUPERVISORS

By state law, Rappahannock County must soon base its assessments for local property taxes on 100 percent of fair market value. But the date of implementation and the procedures to be followed in the reassessment have to be decided by the county

supervisors, according to Fred Forberg, director of the property tax division from the state o ce of taxation.

Forberg explained the options open to the supervisors at a work session last Thursday attended by

E. P. Luke, Dick Latham, Hubert Gilkey and H. B. Wood, along with clerk Diane Bruce, commissioner of revenue Merle Scoggin and deputy commissioner Becky Burke.

According to Forberg, 1981 is the year that the county must reassess at 100 percent of fair market value with the new gures re ected in tax bills that go out in 1982. But, he told the supervisor, if they wait until the deadline, the reassessment will have to be done by a more expensive private rm instead of by the state tax o ce.

Should the supervisors opt for reassessment it will have to be done by a more expensive private rm instead of by the state tax o ce, then they have to complete the process in 1980, the last year that the General Assembly will allow state appraisers to o er this type of service.

Amissville Volunteer Fire Department president Jack Atkins estimates that damage from the re that broke out at the department’s building last Thursday, Feb. 14, is between $75,000 and $100,000.

“But that’s just my gure,” he added, noting that the o cial appraisal will come from the insurance company representative who inspected the re hall on Wednesday.

According to Atkins, the insurance company has o cially classi ed the re as of “undetermined origin” although the blaze is suspected to have been sparked by an “electrical problem.”