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| County personal property assessment forms due today; penalties apply if late |
By: Darrell Todd Maurina
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Posted: Monday, March 1, 2010 4:13 pm
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County Assessor Roger Harrison says he needs assessment forms back today.
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PULASKI COUNTY, Mo. (March 1, 2010) — More than 4,000 people living in Pulaski County have only a few hours left to turn in their personal property tax forms, according to County Assessor Roger Harrison.
“We sent out something over 12,000 and we had about 4,700 still out last week,” Harrison said. “There are a substantial amount still out there.”
Many of the missing forms are from people who have moved out of Pulaski County, but nearly everyone with a legal residence in Pulaski County at the end of 2009 needs to turn in a form, Harrison said, even if they have since moved elsewhere.
Cars, trucks and mobile homes owned by people who don’t own the property on which the mobile home is placed are the most common types of personal property for which people must turn in a personal property assessment form, Harrison said. If people don’t turn in their assessment forms or don’t pay their taxes, they won’t be able to get or renew their license plates.
Harrison said the post office typically forwards mail for people who have moved out of the area; those who leave the county with an unpaid tax bill can still be collected up to three years in the future.
The Pulaski County Courthouse closes at 4:30 p.m., but Harrison said there are several other options available for people who haven’t turned in their assessment forms by that deadline.
One of the easiest is to cross the street behind the courthouse and drop off the form at the Waynesville post office. Doing that will cost the price of a first-class stamp but could prevent up to $100 in penalties for failure to declare personal property, Harrison said. Assessment forms postmarked by March 1 are still acceptable, he said, and should be mailed to 301 East Historic Route 66 in Waynesville.
Other options include e-mailing the form if the person sending the e-mail has a scanner and can send a .pdf or photo file of the assessment form to Harrison’s office, or faxing the form to his office.
The e-mail address is pulaskiassessor@leblink.com and the FAX number is (573) 774-4722
People can also call his office at (573) 774-4717, which can be convenient if there are no changes in the assessed property. Those who don’t turn in their forms can face penalties of $10 for each $1,000 of assessed value, up to a maximum of $100.
“They don’t leave too much room to forego those; a bad address is one thing that would cause that, or if it’s somehow the county’s fault that they did not receive a list or did not get assessed,” Harrison said.
While vehicles and mobile homes are the most common type of personal property on the assessment form, other items need to be listed as well. Harrison cited farm equipment, livestock, business equipment, boats, motors, trailers, four-wheelers, and motorcycles as other items that must be declared; less-common items such as airplanes are also listed in a detailed itemization of personal property on the form.
“The assessment list has appropriate spaces for everything that is taxable,” Harrison said.
Military personnel whose home of record in other states are handled somewhat differently when it comes to vehicles, Harrison said.
“They can use their LES if they want to get a Missouri license; they can bypass us and go directly to the license office and use their LES as a paid tax receipt,” Harrison said.
For those in Pulaski County who are legally residents of Missouri, Harrison said having the assessment form in on time is important to the proper functioning of his office.
“I’d just appreciate it if everybody would make a good effort to get them in to us. We have a limited amount of time to get them processed, and time slowly runs out on us,” Harrison said.
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