The county board is bracing itself for many property owners to oppose the new commercial values in tax court, but the board is still looking to do what it can to resolve the differences now.

The board agreed to bring Vanguard Appraisals, the company the board hired to reappraise all the county’s commercial properties, to meet with property owners who weren’t able to meet with Vanguard officials to discuss their properties during initial meetings held last week.

Many property owners weren’t able to meet with Vanguard to discuss the new values because of time and scheduling conflicts. Vanguard officials will now come back April 17 for additional meetings.

But the meetings may not be enough for some property owners.

“I think we’re probably going to end up in tax court on a bunch of these,” Commissioner Ray Tucker said.

The county hired Vanguard to completely redo the commercial property assessments after county workers found discrepancies in current values. The company is coming up with new values from scratch, meaning it’s basing values on recent sales of similar properties and not a property’s current assessed value.

Tucker said he hopes Vanguard will be able to defend the values in tax court. It is written into Vanguard’s contract to testify at tax court.

Commissioner Jerry Reinartz said he’s concerned about the cost of values challenged in tax court.

Commissioners said they’ve heard from many property owners unhappy about their new values.

Overall, the commercial properties are slated to take on 29 percent more of the tax burden if Vanguard’s values are approved for 2013, but some of that increase comes from new construction.

The new appraisals don’t create any new tax revenue, it just shifts taxes from residential and ag land.

Board Chairman Mike Ankeny said it’s important for business owners to have another chance to meet with Vanguard if they didn’t have the chance before.

“I feel we owe this to the people to give them an opportunity if they were turned away to comeback,” he said.

Assessor Rich Peterson said property owners can call his office to sign up for a 20-minute slot to meet with Vanguard officials on April 17.

He said some values have changed at prior meetings, but he said not all have changed.

“There were some adjustments made there,” Peterson said.

He urged people to bring new information about their property to the meetings, or else they’re likely to go away with no change.

Reinartz said many of the vast changes in property value show properties were either undervalued before or are overvalued now.

The board hasn’t yet fully adopted the new values. If passed, the new assessments take effect in 2013.

Board readies plan for new district map

The county board got a more definitive look at the proposed changes to commissioner districts Tuesday.

Auditor-treasurer Doug Groh outlined the redistricting proposal to the board, noting the biggest changes are coming in Tim Gabrielson’s 1st District and Tony Bennett’s 4th District. A section of about 310 people in near Lansing will shift from the 1st District to 4th District to balance out populations.

Another 270 people in Mike Ankeny’s 5th District near Fourth Avenue SW will shift wards, meaning they’ll still be in Ankeny’s district but will vote at Southgate instead of Austin High School.

Groh said changes are made to keep the population balanced. He said the ideal district sizes are 79,000 for Minnesota Senate districts, 39,000 for House of Representative districts and about 7,832 for commissioner districts.

Citizens can submit their redistricting plans by April 30. The board will adopt a redistricting plan at 10:05 a.m. at its May 1 meeting.