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Show County Value Drop Crimps Local Budgets Assjcssed valuation in Grand County this year registered a drop in excess ex-cess of $3.2 million to bring the County to the lowest total valuation since 1963, according to County Assessor Kenneth Beach. The drop in valuation brought the figures for the County to $18.8 million compared with $22.2 mil lion a year ago. Most of .the drop, according to Beach, is due to the conversion con-version of the Texas Gulf Sulphur Co. potash operation opera-tion from underground min-'.ijrig min-'.ijrig tfci solution mining. Some $2.9 million in valuation valu-ation was dropped from the Grand County tax rolls at .the Cane Creek operation. The new ponds, which have been built by the company, are located in San Juan County and do not, therefore there-fore provide tax revenues locally. Total assessed valuation val-uation of the potash complex com-plex in Grand County is now left at only $942,523. This is the first ye;,r, Beach said, when assessments assess-ments on personal property proper-ty made by the County Assessor have been great, er than those assessed by the State Tax Commission. Locally some $9,754,837 was assessed and the State lislied valuations at $9,-V060.857. $9,-V060.857. The figures for last year were listed .as $12,307,107 for the State and $9,90 1,831 locally. The State Tax Commis- . sion assesses values on mining min-ing and industrial property and oil and gas operations, and the assessor in each county is responsible for placing values on all other personal property. Nearly $200,000 will be lost in revenues by the. drop in valuation. Of th at amount, the County will lose $35,709. Grand County Coun-ty Commissioners indicated that it may be necessary to raise the mill levy to recover the loss. If the ley is raised, it will be by about 2.5 mills to net the lost $35,000. Hardest hit by the loss in tax revenues is the school system where a losi of $112,400 from County funds is expected. Some of this loss will be made up by an increase in funds ilrom the Uniform School Fund, where an additional $13,800 can be expected in maintenance and operation oper-ation expenses. No aid car. be expected on the capital outlay budget, however. A drop in assessed valuation val-uation was expected by school (officials but estimates esti-mates placed it in the 'million range. Therefore, the school budget for 1971- 72 was placed around a figure of $21,750,000. This cut will necessitate some cutting of expenditures and "belt tightening" to bring the figures into line. In the maintenance and operation budget, no additional mill levy can be set without a vole of the people, and local school officials this week indicated that they planned to cut the budget wherever possible, and that they would not ask for a voted leeway levy at this time. Under capital outlay, the budget was figured on a base of $255,800 in tax monies. In reality, there will only be about $222,000 for a loss of $33,800. The Board may consider at the next regular meeting, the possibility of an additional 2 mill levy to make up the loss in capital outlay. Un- der maintenance and operation, oper-ation, $596,800 was planned plan-ned and only $518,200 will be received from the County. Coun-ty. The Uniform School Fund allocation will leave the net loss at about $3-1,-800, for a total loss in revenues rev-enues somewhere in the neighborhood of $68,600. The cut in valuation from values assessed by the State Tax Commission was unexpected, according to School Board Piesident Sam Taylor, since it was the State agency whi'.h gave the local district estimates esti-mates on which io build the newly approved budget which now needs to be overhauled and trimmed. "We oould make a wild guess at valuation and come closer than they have come the prist couple of years," Taylor said. . |