Month: April 2017

The work of the Downtown Development Authority is largely funded by a small ad valorem or property tax of 8.64 mills levied on properties within the area called the Downtown Development District. Every four years, parish tax assessors do what is called a ‘reassessment’ in which they determine whether values have gone up or down. The tax rate is based on that assessment. Each year in late summer as DDA staff begins preparing the budget for the upcoming year, they contact the tax assessors in Caddo and Bossier Parishes and the City of Shreveport Finance Director to determine the best estimate of what that ad valorem number is expected to be. This number is the basis of the DDA budget. In 2016 while preparing the budget, the City of Shreveport and the DDA were told that the assessed value of properties within the City had increased. Accordingly, the adjusted DDA millages was decreased from 8.640 to 8.550 mills. Here’s why. Even though the millage went down, the values went up- meaning  the same amount of budgetary dollars would have been collected. Unfortunately, that turned out to be incorrect and very surprising.  In November 2016, when the City received the actual tax rolls the assessed values of property within the bounds of the Shreveport Downtown Development District had actually decreased, rather than increased as the City was initially informed in...