Sussex County’s general reassessment of all properties wil bel extended for an additional year.
Officials announced that the County will extend the reassessment project by one year, which was triggered by an education funding lawsuit filed against the State of Delaware and all three counties in 2018. The case was settled in 2021, with all three counties agreeing to conduct property reassessments.
Groups filing the lawsuit argued that the lack of reassessments in the state led to inequities that starved school districts of funding.
Under terms of the original settlement, Sussex County was scheduled to complete its reassessment project by 2024, in time for tax bills to be issued in late summer and ahead of the annual Sept. 30 tax payment deadline. That timeline has now shifted to 2025.
County officials said the extension is due to higher-than-expected staff turnover by vendor Tyler Technologies.
“This is a tremendous lift, in any jurisdiction, but especially in a county the size of Sussex. With so many parcels, and limited staffing, it is taking considerably longer for our vendor to do the necessary work,” Finance Director Gina A. Jennings said. “We want this done right – accurately and fairly – and the year extension will allow Tyler Technologies to do that.”
Reassessments are designed to be revenue neutral, with a third of tax bills going down, a third going up, and the remainder seeing no change.
For more information on Sussex County’s reassessment project, visit https://empower.tylertech.com/Sussex-County-Delaware.html.
