Lackawanna and Schuylkill counties have finished reassessing the value of all real estate and almost simultaneously let homeowners know their new property values.
With one huge difference.
Schuylkill mailed new-value notices that also let people know their estimated county property taxes next year.
Lackawanna mailed new-value notices without estimated taxes.
Governments use assessed property values to set property tax rates, the basis for collecting property taxes.
Lackawanna County residents have repeatedly criticized the county for failing to estimate taxes on new-value notices. They say knowing estimated taxes helps a property owner determine whether to appeal a new assessment.
“If they (Tyler officials) haven't provided those details to you, they should immediately. You should demand that,” Susanne Green, 60, of Benton Twp., said at an April 9 commissioners meeting.
Green specifically compared Lackawanna to Schuylkill County.
“They’re (Schuylkill is) sending out the old valuation, the old tax amount, the new valuation, and guess what? The estimated new tax amount,” Green pointed out.
Lackawanna County and Tyler Technologies officials have repeatedly said actual future property taxes can’t be known until the values are finalized Nov. 15. The county hired Tyler in 2022 to carry out the reassessment.
“Unfortunately, we keep hearing the same question,” Tyler project manager Samantha Edwards said at a Feb. 25 public meeting at North Pocono Middle School. “Everyone wants to know, you know, taxes, tax amounts, how much am I going to pay? And to be perfectly honest, none of us can answer that question tonight.”
They can answer that question, just not definitively. They can provide an estimate.
Schuylkill reassessment in focus
A different company, Vision Government Solutions Inc., carried out Schuylkill’s reassessment and calculated estimated county taxes.
Tim Barr, Vision’s project manager, said the calculation can be done because several factors are known.
Under any reassessment, the total revenue collected in the year before new values take effect must equal the total revenue collected in the first year that new values take effect.
Reassessments generally raise property values. That means the total value of all properties in a county, school district, city, borough or township must rise after a reassessment.
Because the total values rise, tax millage rates must drop to keep revenues the same.
Calculating the new millage rate becomes a simple matter of math.
If you know the total revenues will remain the same and you know the current tax rate, the current total assessed value of all properties and the new total assessed values of all properties, you can calculate the new tax rate.
Barr said he did essentially that but adjusted for two other factors.
First, he took into account that upcoming informal reviews and former appeals of new values between Aug. 1 and Oct. 31 will lower the total assessed value of all properties.
Second, more farms are likely to apply for exceptions that lower assessments under a state program known as Clean and Green, he said.
Barr declined to say by what percentage he reduced the new total assessed value of all 92,000 Schuylkill properties, but he used the new total number to calculate an estimated county tax millage.
The county even posted the results in a sample 2026 preliminary value notification on its website.
Barr acknowledged he could be off and the estimated tax millage rate he used — 3.846 mills — could be higher after all values are finalized in November, but he’s pretty sure he’s close.
“I've been doing this 40 years, and I've been doing tax impact estimates on all my reassessments for decades, but it's a little risky, because it's an estimate,” Barr said. “This is why the law doesn't require tax impact estimates and why many counties don't choose to do it.”
Lackawanna County’s total assessed property values will also likely decline by the time values are finalized in November, and more farms will apply for Clean and Green, too. That means final millage rates will climb.
Unlike Schuylkill, Lackawanna isn’t providing an estimated tax.
After the April 9 meeting, a WVIA reporter asked Lackawanna County Commissioner Bill Gaughan to look into whether the county could provide estimated taxes and noted what Schuylkill did.
Gaughan said he would.
At the April 16 commissioners meeting, Green and others returned and asked again for more transparency.
“Do we not believe in transparency? Because I know you do. So, what's the reason?” Green asked.
“Schuylkill County is almost at the exact same level of their reassessment as Lackawanna County ... If they can provide the estimated new tax, why can't we? Why are we saying to our citizens, you won't know your new taxes until next year, when we figure it out.”
'They don't want to do that'
After the meeting, WVIA again asked Gaughan about the difference between the two counties.
“I asked that question” of Tyler, Gaughan said. “And they gave it to me. They don't want to do that.”
Gaughan referred to an email from Mary Noldy, Tyler’s appraisal mid-Atlantic regional manager. A county spokesman provided the email.
In an email, Noldy argues “the scope of work for a reassessment is never about taxes.”
“It's always about restoring equity through updated, accurate property values. That's the message we convey to the public throughout the process; educating people that good data equals good values, and bad data may result in bad values,” Noldy wrote in the email.
She cites state law governing reassessment and says the law never cites taxes.
“Still, in some cases, clients may choose to prepare an estimated tax impact statement,” Noldy acknowledges. “I never recommend doing so when the base year exceeds 30 years and/or the county anticipates a large increase in C&G properties. Lackawanna checks off both of those boxes.”
Lackawanna’s base year for property taxes is 1968, 57 years ago. C&G refers to the Clean & Green program.
As Noldy points out, someone who appeals a new assessed value can’t use higher taxes as a reason. But people decide whether to appeal based on whether their taxes will go up, which Commissioner Chris Chermak pointed out at the April 16 meeting.
Chermak said Schuylkill’s notice is “much more informative.”
“So, it gives you a little more information, but most importantly, it gives you your estimated taxes. Which is critical, because that is what everyone is afraid of,” he said. “They're afraid of what they don't know and what they're going to possibly receive next year, and once they receive their bill, they have to pay it ... We don't need to reinvent the wheel here. There’s other counties doing this.”
'Wait until the values are finalized'
Lackawanna County Director of Assessments Patrick Tobin said the county commissioners don’t want to issue tax estimates because upcoming appeals will lower the total assessed value, which will raise the final millage rates.
“We have no idea how many people are going to appeal,” Tobin said. “We also have no idea who's going to appeal. Some of the so-called big hitters may appeal and they may win, which would create significant differences in values.”
Taxpayers could get angry when the higher millage rates turn out higher in November than before appeals, Tobin said.
“And then they're all coming back saying, ‘No, no, you said it was going to be this (tax millage rate),’” he said. “So, we want to wait until the values are finalized before we release the information to the public. So, then millage rates could be definitively set.”
Barr said he doesn’t think Lackawanna County is wrong for refusing to provide a tax estimate.
“I'm not trying to just give Lackawanna some cover, ... but I want you to understand the reasoning,” he said. “Nobody's wrong. It's just different approach ... The values that they (Lackawanna) mailed, ... they’re not the county's official values yet.”
Both counties’ final totals of all assessed values will drop, Barr said. So, any tax estimates now will be higher later.
“I chose to put an impact statement on ... Vision’s notices, and it's my estimate,” he said. “The commissioners didn't have anything to do with deciding what it was. They just gave me permission to do so. Told them I wanted to do it. Told them why. Told them I'll take the heat if it's not the right number when it all comes down.”
