The Gloucester County Board of Supervisors continued its discussion on the county reassessment during its Jan. 17 meeting in the colonial courthouse. County Assessor Dan Thomas presented the board with December 2022 property sale data to update the board on where the reassessments stand following another month of sales.

Thomas said the data collected from property sales in December 2022 came in at 91 percent of the new assessed data. The data suggests that the assessed valuations of properties are representative of the current market.

Thomas said he anticipates around 500 total property appeals to be made, which represents around 2 percent of the total properties Gloucester. He said they’ve addressed about 450 appeals thus far with about half receiving valuation adjustments. He said with only having about 2 percent Gloucester’s of property owners appealing leads him to believe that most Gloucester residents understand their property values.

Thomas said when conducting the reassessment, he and his staff used an 18-month sample period of July 2021 through December 2022 to collect the sample data for the reassessment.

Board member Dr. Robert “JJ” Orth said though 18 months for collecting sales data for a reassessment is shorter than any timeframe Gloucester had used for past reassessments, the total number of sales for the 18-month period was greater than past reassessments.

Orth said since the sample size of sales collected for this reassessment was greater than past assessments, despite the sample period being shorter, he believes the reassessment conducted by Thomas is more accurate in reflecting the market than ones conducted in the past.

Supervisor Phillip Bazzani asked Thomas if he viewed the sales in that 18-month period as an anomaly due to the inflated market. He said assessors in other counties used sales from the past few years to conduct the reassessment in their localities to make up for the inflated market of 2022.

Thomas said he doesn’t view data as inflated or the last year as an anomaly. He said the data is what it is and that other localities didn’t have the same sample size of sales that Gloucester had to work with.

Bazzani was adamant that the sample period was still too small as it only accounted for sales within an 18-month period of high inflation. He said that he conducted an assessment of his own property using the same method Thomas used and saw his valuation reduced by about $50,000, which he said would still be an inflated valuation.

Bazzani also said a constituent told him that Thomas said to them that the reassessed value of their home was partly based on how the exterior of the home looked. Bazzani asked Thomas if he were to place inoperable cars all over his front yard would it bring down his assessment even if the home itself hadn’t changed.

“Not only would it compromise your assessment, but it would compromise the assessment of your neighbors,” Thomas replied.

Board member Ashley Chriscoe said Thomas and his staff did an outstanding job for the reassessment. He said the reassessment accurately represents the market.

However, Chriscoe also said that some of the houses that were sold during the 18-month period that was used were not worth what they were sold for. He said the fair market value for these homes doesn’t match their true value.

Chriscoe said he’s still in favor of holding off on implementing the reassessment until later this year in hopes that inflation in housing market will level out. He suggested consulting with Thomas again in June to see if they should go forward with the reassessment or conduct another one.

Board chair Christopher Hutson agreed with Chriscoe in waiting for the summer to make a decision on the reassessment, but should consider following through with the reassessment Thomas has already conducted.

Hutson said the board will equalize the tax rate to minimize the impact of the new assessment. He said once the market goes down and values are reassessed, the board will once again level the tax rate as it has done in the past.

Gibson said his concern over kicking the reassessment down the road would be it might cost taxpayers more money. He said a lot of money has been spent to conduct this reassessment, which he said was a significant undertaking for county staff. He also said no one on the board can predict the future and, if the market continues to inflate, property values would also rise.

Gibson also said the county should work more towards educating its residents instead of causing fear. He said the board will equalize the tax rate so that taxpayers will pay a similar amount in real estate taxes as they did last year.

Board member Mike Hedrick said in his former profession in statistical analysis, he would always collect data from the period of time that was given, regardless of other factors. He said if the county is set on a two-year reassessment cycle, then it needs to conduct reassessments every two years regardless of the state of the housing market.

“The data is the data,” said Hedrick.

Board member Kevin Smith said there was no guarantee that the market wouldn’t worsen within the next year and that he was in favor of moving forward with this reassessment and not to delay it any longer.

The board will continue its reassessment discussions during its board retreat on Feb. 9, beginning at 8:30 a.m. at Whitcomb Lodge.

Citizen comment

Several members of the Northern Neck Patriots spoke at the Jan. 17 meeting during the citizen comment period on the state of the Northern Neck Regional Jail.

Tom Jefferies, NNP Chairman, commented on the state of the Northern Neck Regional Jail and its detainees from the Jan. 6, 2021 U.S. Capitol riot. He said those commonly referred to as J-Sixers are pretrial detainees, who do not deserve to be imprisoned along with convicted felons.

He said the J-Sixers have exposed how poorly prisoners are treated in the jail. He said the J-Sixers have little to lose for speaking their minds as they are not career criminals. Jefferies said there are claims from J-Sixers that the staff has neglected their medical needs., and that he hopes those speaking out will be transported to better facilities.

Ron Nelson of Westmoreland County and NNP member also spoke on the state of the Northern Neck Regional Jail and the treatment of J-Sixers. Nelson said he’s heard claims of rotten food being served to inmates. He said the Jail Board has heard similar complaints but has called them baseless because no members of the jail staff had brought evidence to base the claims on.

Later in the meeting, Bazzani asked County Administrator Carol Steele if Gloucester was liable for any of the claims commenters made, if those claims were proven true. Bazzani said he would think nothing at the jail was being swept under the rug but asked if there had been any independent look at the facility.

Steele said Gloucester has nothing to do with the legal side of the jail, its prisoners or their crimes. She said the care of the inmates is a constant topic of discussion. The complaints from neglecting medical needs to inmates having to pay to file complaints or officers ordering an inmate to be beaten have all been investigated with no findings, she said.

Steele said the FBI was involved in one case were a J-Sixer tried to sue the jail to only have that case thrown out. She said another inmate said their dietary restrictions were not being met, but that was disproved. She said hearing these claims is upsetting, but the jail board is doing a better job of communicating openly to address these claims.