Apr. 24—SUPERIOR — The assessment review board for the city will meet June 4 within the legal timeline required by state law. However, board members will simply adjourn the meeting until 9 a.m. Sept. 24 because the 2025 assessment roll is not complete.
Dates for the release of the assessment roll and open book hearings have not been confirmed, but city officials anticipate the Sept. 24 meeting will include a review of the assessment roll and a chance for property owners to object to their valuations.
The delay comes after the city has been without a full-time assessor since early February and questions remain about the city’s compliance with state law following a citywide revaluation in 2024.
State law requires property assessments collectively be assessed within 90% to 110% of fair market value, the latter of which is determined by the state.
“There is some question about whether or not we are going to come in under compliance,” Mayor Jim Paine said. “So, we were not compliant as of the end of last year, which was our final year and therefore would trigger a reassessment.”
The city’s Human Resources Committee authorized filling the open assessor position on Monday, April 21 after approving an updated job description.
However, the administrative delay in filling the position is not connected to the delay in completing the 2025 assessment roll, Paine said.
The city is waiting for the Wisconsin Department of Revenue to determine whether the city’s assessments are compliant with state law.
Colin Payton, the city’s property appraiser and acting assessor, said he will begin the necessary compliance checks with the Department of Revenue starting Monday, April 28. However, he said he’s been monitoring economic trends and sales from the last year and values are lining up with where they should be.
Payton said, with the timing of the
assessor’s departure
there simply wasn’t time to have a contractor come in to do an evaluation of everything.
“If there is some adjustment that can be made prior to finalizing the roll, then I will … pursue that,” Payton said.
“There’s a very real possibility that it will come in compliant, but all that would mean is that we don’t have to do a full revaluation of all commercial and residential,” Paine said. “We would still be reevaluating a number of commercial properties.”
Paine said there is still the possibility that large commercial properties were valued too low.
“There’s still going to be a pretty aggressive effort on the large commercial properties,” Paine said, noting it does not include small retail properties.
Paine said that work will continue until the full assessment book for 2025 is done.
That full book includes all assessments citywide that will be reviewed by the Assessment Board of Review when it meets in September.
“I have been hopeful that as we raise the commercial values, that should offset a lot of those new, higher residential values,” Paine said.
Paine said even if the city is required to conduct another full revaluation, he doesn’t anticipate the property values will change as dramatically as they did in 2024.
Prior to the revaluation in 2024, the city’s overall assessed value was about 63% of fair market value, according to Department of Revenue data. The city first came out of compliance with state law in 2021 when assessments accounted for about 83% of fair market value.
“Once again, folks should challenge their assessments … if they think they could not sell their property for that amount,” Paine said. He said people would be required to provide information to support their claim, but he encouraged people to call the assessor’s office at 715-395-7222 to make an appointment.
“We will be going into another uncertain tax period with the school district, and we don’t know what will happen with the citywide assessments,” Paine said. “But just to be safe, at the very least, folks need to make sure their assessment is correct, and we absolutely need their help doing that.”