The $18 annual assessment fee against private boat dock, cell tower and billboard business parcels to pay the debt incurred in purchasing the NABORS waste hauling operation and local landfill has been removed.
Baxter County Collector Teresa Smith says the court appointed receiver in the ruling leading to the $18 annual assessment fee against each residence and business parcel in the six-county Ozark Mountain Solid Waste District notified her Monday to remove the fee from parcels containing private boat docks, cell towers and billboards.
Smith says she has received the change requests from Assessor Jayme Nicholson and is in the process of making those amendments and mailing revised tax statements.
Smith says the revised statements are being mailed on bright orange paper, with a notification on the envelopes reading “open immediately” and “attention important tax information enclosed.”
She says refunds to those who have already paid the tax are being processed by the staff in her office. The refunds will be processed once all the revised statements have been mailed.
The $18 annual assessment follows a Pulaski County judge’s April 2017 order. The order is a result of a saga that began when the Northwest Arkansas Regional Solid Waste District defaulted on the payment of principal and interest to the bondholders in November 2012 and stopped trash collections. After the district defaulted on its debt, Bank of the Ozarks–as trustee of the bondholders–sued the district in Pulaski County Circuit Court. With the judge’s ruling came the appointment of Attorney Geoffrey Treece of Little Rock as a court appointed receiver.
A town hall forum is set for Wednesday to address citizen concerns regarding the controversial $18 annual assessment fee. The forum will be held at 2 p.m. in the second floor courtroom of the Baxter County Courthouse.
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