PLEASANT PRAIRIE OFFICE OF ASSESSMENT ADMINISTRATION - AN OVERVIEW OF THE FUNCTIONS THEY PERFORM
Pleasant Prairie’s Office of Assessment Administration was first established in late 1995. The department employs: a full-time real estate analyst (who also serves as the legally required statutory assessor); two full-time appraisers; and one full-time assessment technician.
Upon its establishment, the office created a partnership with other Kenosha County municipalities to help share assessing resources. It currently serves 21,054 parcels or properties within four Kenosha County municipalities.
The primary responsibility of the assessor’s office is to determine an estimate of the fair market value of all taxable property in a municipality (as of January 1 each year) so that all taxpayers only contribute their fair share of property taxes to support the municipal services provided in the community.
Once a municipality or taxing entity (village, county, state, school district, library system) determines the total amount of taxes needed to provide services, property assessments are used to allocate the cost for those services across all taxable properties.
In order to ensure that all property is treated fairly and uniformly, the procedures used by the assessor’s office must conform to Wisconsin laws dealing with property tax valuation as well as commonly accepted appraisal practices. Pleasant Prairie’s assessor’s office:
• maintains a strong knowledge of the local real-estate market, assessing practices and their significance, and State law relating to assessments;
• provides market and value related information to realtors, appraisers, financial institutions, attorneys, reporters, residents, and prospective residents;
• performs frequent revaluations (every two years) for all Village properties; and
• maintains property records for all properties in the Village.
To learn more about Pleasant Prairie’s Office of Assessment Administration and how property values are determined in the Village, please click here.