MERCER, LAWRENCE COUNTIES Tax-relief applications pour in from homeowners

School districts must opt in to the tax relief plan.
By HAROLD GWINand LAURE CIOFFI
VINDICATOR PA. STAFF
Applications from homeowners looking for tax relief through state gambling revenue are pouring into Mercer and Lawrence County assessor offices daily.
Michael DeForest, Mercer County assessor, said the forms are coming into his office at the rate of about 500 a day. In Lawrence County, those forms are coming in at a rate of 150 to 300 a day, said Mary Bullano, county assessor.
School districts in both counties sent out "Application for Homestead and Farmstead Exclusions" to all property owners in October, advising them to fill out the forms and send them to the county assessor's office.
The districts will do a second mailing Dec. 31 to remind those who haven't filled out the forms to do so by March 1, the filing deadline.
Anyone hoping to take advantage of Act 72, the Pennsylvania law passed earlier this year that allows slot machine gambling in Pennsylvania, must file an application.
School districts must take part
That doesn't mean they will automatically get a break on school district real estate taxes once slot machine gambling actually begins, however.
Their home school districts must choose to participate in the tax reform program first.
To do that, each district must enact a 0.1 percent increase in their earned-income tax.
School districts in Pennsylvania are limited to a 0.5 percent earned-income tax.
"It's running quite smoothly," DeForest said, noting that about 10,000 applications have arrived since the Oct. 18 mailing of the forms and about 7,700 of them have been processed so far.
He anticipates getting a total of about 20,000 applications.
In Lawrence County, about 13,000 of the 59,000 forms sent have been returned, Bullano said.
Calls are coming in daily from those who don't understand the forms, she said. Bullano recommends everyone send them back even though the tax break won't occur until 2006 or 2007 for the school districts that choose to participate.
Minimum slots revenue
The tax break will go into effect after the state has earned $900 million from the slots.
According to the Penn State Local Tax Reform Education Project, $500 million will be distributed to the school districts and $400 million will be held in reserves.
Pennsylvania tried a homestead tax reform for school real estate taxes four years ago, and Mercer County got a lot of applications at that time, DeForest said.
Only four of the 501 public school districts in Pennsylvania opted to participate in the Act 50 effort, however, and it died, he said.
Filing under the Act 50 program no longer counts, and property owners in Mercer County must file again under Act 72, DeForest added.