Other Preservation Funding #2: Current Use Property Taxes

In an interview with the Colombian editorial board, representatives of the Historic Trust stated “There is no other path, because of the economics.”  As we saw when we talked about the unused development potential, there is a source of funding that the Trust has not pursued.  If there is one, could there be more?

The answer is yes.

Let’s start with a smaller one.  Even though the Historic Trust is a nonprofit, it still pays property taxes, and has been paying them since they bought the Academy .. to the tune of over $100,000 per year.  Commercial property taxes are based on the market value of the land, which is typically the “highest and best use.”  That means property owners pay taxes on what the land could be used for, not what it IS being used for.

That is, unless the land has a historic building on it.  In that case, Clark County has a special program where the land can be taxed at its current use rather than its market value.  The value of the Academy’s current use is easily less than half of its market value, which would make a tremendous difference in the taxes that must be paid, perhaps as much as $200-$300,000 in just the 4 years the Trust has owned the property.

But we can see from public tax records that the Historic Trust has not participated in this program.  Think of how much restoration hundreds of thousands of dollars could have paid for, and how much those savings could fund in the future.  

And this isn’t even the biggest untapped resource, we'll talk about that one next.