Online political influencers have buzzed about removing property taxes since the Nov. 5 election. Ideas include allowing senior citizens to skip paying school taxes, halting property taxes for homeowners once the property is paid off, and dropping property taxes altogether.
The general idea is that land and residences should completely belong to the property owner. Property taxes allow for the government to have some control over your property because the government can confiscate it and sell the property at auction if taxes aren’t paid.
Florida is considering doing away with property taxes for everyone. A state Senate proposal wants a study on possibly replacing its $43 billion in property tax revenue with sales taxes and budget cuts. Gov. Ron DeSantis made waves on social media challenging property taxes saying it was an “oppressive and ineffective form of taxation.”
Analysts state the problem is local counties and cities depend on property taxes to run school systems and county government. In Florida, 73% of property taxes go to local school districts and 18% go to operate county government. Another 17% go to local cities.
How would such an idea of eliminating property taxes work in Georgia?
While there isn’t a similar proposal in Georgia, citizens have an appetite for reducing or eliminating property taxes. Citizens voted in November to limit residential property taxes with 63% supporting a state constitutional amendment capping property tax increases.
However, more than half of Georgia’s 180 school districts are seeking to opt out of the new law’s limits. That is prompting citizen opposition to local school boards and has some legislators scurrying to find ways to eliminate the opt-out clause in the previous ballot measure.
Georgia collected $33.7 billion in taxes in 2023, which are the last numbers available. It ranks 15 on the list of states with the highest taxes. California ranks first with $220.59 billion in taxes and Florida is fifth with $61.9 billion in taxes collected. The numbers include all forms of taxes.
There aren’t online numbers showing how much Bartow County takes in property taxes but the average property tax is $921 for a home valued at $146,800. Fulton County has the highest property taxes with an average of $2,733 yearly on standard properties. Warren County has the lowest with an average tax of $314 per property.
Some of those differences occur because some counties have more expensive properties. However, the differences in the taxes collected are also because counties charge different rates on the fair assessed market value of the property.
Bartow County charges .63% of a property’s assessed fair market value while Fulton County’s rate is 1.08% and Warren County’s rate is .51%.
Here is a quick list of property tax rates around Northwest Georgia:
Floyd County .78%
Polk County .72%
Haralson County .7%
Paulding County .93%
Cherokee County .83%
Cobb County .79%
Gilmer County .54%
Pickens County .66%
Gordon County .61%
Chattooga County .63%
Walker County .64%
Catoosa County .66%
Whitfield County .58%
Murray County .54%
Fannin County .37%
Local Georgia counties depend on property tax money to fund both school and county budgets. The Bartow County BOE approved a $286.64 million tentative operating budget for fiscal year 2025. The Bartow County budget has a budget of just under $200 million, more than the 2024 operating budget of $125.2 million. Around 45 percent of the county budget goes to public safety, primarily the Bartow County Sheriff’s Department.
Like property taxes, each county also has differing sales tax rates. For instance, Bartow County has a 7% sales tax rate. That includes a 4% state sales tax and an additional 3% that goes to the county. Most of the Northwest Georgia counties hold to that rate. Cherokee and Cobb Counties only charge an additional 2% local sales tax, so the total sales tax rate is 6%.
The difference between collecting property taxes and sales taxes is that everyone pays sales taxes while only those who own property pay property taxes. For a property tax elimination plan like what is proposed in Florida to work in Georgia, both state and local sales taxes would need to rise.
Some argue that using sales taxes to fund county and school budgets is a fairer tax because everyone would contribute, including those who don’t live locally such as travelers and tourists. That is the idea behind the one-cent Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax (SPLOST) used to build specific projects. A high sales tax could affect tourism, especially if neighboring counties or states charge much less.
Others argue that using sales taxes to completely fund local governments is unfair because poorer people would be paying more direct taxes in purchasing items they need. They currently pay for property tax but it’s indirectly paid in their rent. It’s uncertain how much rent would be reduced if all property taxes are eliminated and there has been no discussion of how to make sure landlords pass the savings to tenants.
