TAX CUTS -- NOT INCREASES -- ARE NEEDED

A plan to increase the assessed valuation of Missouri farmland has a serious flaw. The Missouri Tax Commission's proposal completely ignores the fact that Missourians are paying hundreds of millions of dollars in excess state taxes already.

More than that, the Tax Commission's proposal avoids voter approval, a concept that is embedded in this state's taxation process. Yet the Tax Commission's plan will automatically go into effect unless the Legislature acts to prevent it.

In 1987, a Tax Commission's plan for increasing assessments was rebuffed by the Legislature, but another plan was allowed to take effect in 1995. Many taxpayers who have received property-tax bills in the last month have been hit with sizable increases, thanks to state-mandated reassessment that mainly affected residential and commercial property.

Missouri's property-tax system is already uneven. Residential and commercial property are assessed based on their market value. Residential property is assessed at 19 percent of market value, and commercial property is assessed at 15 percent of market value. Farmland is taxes on its production value, ranging from virtually unproductive land such as an abandoned quarry all the way up to top-producing farmland like the rich soil found in Southeast Missouri's delta area. Agricultural land is assessed at 12 percent of whatever production category it falls into.

The Tax Commission's plan would raise the per-acre value in all but the lowest of the eight production categories. The effect would be to raise assessed values for top-producing land by 17 percent.

A better plan, given Missouri's situation with massive excess tax revenue, would be for the Tax Commission to lower the residential and commercial assessment rates -- at least until real cuts in state income and sales taxes kick in and give taxpayers the long overdue break they deserve.

It is hard to fathom why the Tax Commission would even consider ways to increase anyone's tax burden, given the hundreds of millions of dollars waiting to be refunded. Local governments -- counties, cities and school districts -- might make a strong argument for the need for more tax revenue, but they would have a hard time convincing many taxpayers in view of the state's overwhelming disregard for tax limits and speedy refunds.