NORWICH — The Selectboard set the municipal property tax rate on Tuesday following a strenuous and delayed town-wide reappraisal.
During a special meeting on Tuesday, the Selectboard voted unanimously to set the municipal property tax rate to 51 cents per $100 of assessed property value, down 18 cents from last year’s rate.
Owners of a home worth $500,000 can expect to pay $2,550 in municipal property taxes.
While the tax rate went down, the value of the grand list, the total value of property in town, increased 59% to $1.24 billion, after the first town-wide reappraisal since 2016.
Completing the reappraisal “has been a haul,” Cheryl Lindberg, one of the three members of the Board of Listers, said in a phone interview Tuesday. “We’re glad to be done.”
At an Aug. 15 meeting the listers lodged the grand list “under protest and with reservations,” the meeting’s minutes said.
Delays, errors on property cards and a lack of interior inspections by the firm contracted to carry out the reassessment has left the listers with lingering concerns over the reappraisal process, Lindberg said.
“There have been many ups, downs and disappointments along the way,” Lindberg said in the meeting minutes. “Through it all, the Listers remained determined to keep the process moving forward.”
In December of 2022, the town contracted with Massachusetts-based KRT Appraisal to complete a reappraisal by the summer of 2024. Last June, the two parties amended the contract to extend the deadlines by a year when “it became clear that the reappraisal work wasn’t as far along as it needed to be,” an announcement on the town’s website said.
Still, KRT did not meet this year’s contractual deadlines, including lodging the grand list by July 25, Lindberg said.
KRT did not respond to the Valley News’ questions by deadline.
At Town Meeting in March, voters decided the first installment of property taxes is due Aug. 29, a deadline that will not be met.
Tax bills are due 30 days after they are mailed out. It may take the finance department up to seven days after Tuesday’s special meeting to mail out the bills, according to the meeting’s minutes.
“I know the appraisal situation in the state is really challenging,” said Ted Brady, executive director of Vermont League and Cities and Towns. “Finding people to do the appraisal can take years. Doing the appraisal can take years. It doesn’t surprise me that there would be delays.”
The town is obligated to pay KRT $190,000. The contract doesn’t include any penalties for missing deadlines.
KRT also did not do as many interior inspections as the listers expected, which could account for the high number of inaccuracies in the reappraisal data, Lindberg said.
Residents who believed their reassessment was incorrect had a chance to challenge it in a grievance hearing. KRT is contractually obligated to defend the values they determined during the reappraisal throughout the appeals process.
“We had 193 grievances, which is more than normal for a reappraisal year,” Lindberg said. She expected there to be closer to 160 grievances.
Of the 193 residents who submitted grievances, about 160 of them received an adjustment to their appraisal, Lindberg said, causing the value of the final grand list to drop about $2 million from the preliminary calculation of the value of all of the property in town.
During the grievance hearings, which took place between July 17 and Aug. 8, “60-hour weeks were not uncommon,” for the listers, Lindberg said.
“I dropped in to see (the listers) right after they had lodged the 2025 grand list, and THEY LOOKED TERRIBLE!” Selectboard member Priscilla Vincent wrote to the Norwich Listserv on Aug. 16. “Their eyes were red with fatigue, their faces were sagging, and they were overall kind of limp. But they did it.”
While the listers’ role in the reappraisal process is over, residents can appeal the decision of their grievance hearing with the Board of Civil Authority, comprised of the town clerk, Selectboard and justices of the peace.
Those who wish to appeal must submit a written appeal to Lily Trajman, the town clerk, by the end of the day on Aug. 29, Trajman said.