Clark County Close Up

0:00 ♪♪ Safety and customer service upgrades are coming to the county's joint lobby. Located on the second floor of the Clark County Public Service Center, the joint lobby is a one-stop shop for customer service with the county's assessor, auditor, and treasurer's office.

0:57 We are the only county in the country that we know of that cross-trained our staff, breaking down those silos where they can take any transaction that is occurring on the second floor. We record documents in the auditor's office. We issue mayor's licenses from the auditor's office. In the joint lobby, staff from all three offices are trained and have the ability to do all those tasks. It's very unique. Most people that are coming in don't actually know is it an auditor function, is it a treasurer function, or is it assessor function. They basically can help them and not be sending people back and forth between offices. After 22 years of serving customers, starting March 9th, the joint lobby will be closed for in-person services during the construction of the remodel. We are looking at ways to make it more safe and secure for staff since they're interacting a lot with cash transactions in the space, and then also technology changes.

1:55 These desks, they weren't designed with the modern functionality that's needed to do the business here. The joint lobby remodel will take about 16 weeks with an estimated reopening around the start of summer. During this construction window, all three offices encourage customers to use online services or mail applications, documents, or payments. So people can apply for the senior exemption program online. We also do a lot of outreach for the senior exemption program in the assessor's office where we go out to different cities and set up mobile-y. We're just going to be ramping those up this year so we can serve the people out in their community. We really are going to want people to make the application for a marriage license online, and they'll mail the packet to people. You can return the documents. We have a drop box downstairs in the foyer. The drop box on the first floor of the Clark County Public Service Center is an option instead of mailing documents or a payment.

2:54 And remember, first half property taxes are due on April 30th. Folks can go online and pay by e-check for free, or they can pay by credit card, which is a small fee by our vendor. But they can also still put their check in the mail with our remittance envelope. If someone wants a receipt, they'll just write "receipt" on the envelope and we'll mail it to them. Other options is we will have a drive-through kiosk like years past, and I'll be in there with my team accepting payments on April 29th and 30th from the hours of 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. The two-day kiosk is located at the East Garage entrance next to the Public Service Center on Franklin Street. If a customer has any questions or wants to set up an in-person appointment with one of the three offices, visit clark.wa.gov/jointlobby for a list of contact information.

3:48 The Clark County Neighborhood Program celebrated its 30th anniversary in January 2026, marking three decades of fostering community engagement and support for local neighborhood associations. My name is Bill Klein. My role with the Neighborhood Association is that I am the president of Northeast Hazel Hill Neighborhood Association. We're here to talk about the history of the Neighborhood Association and the program and what the Neighborhood Association does for the general public of the members of that association. The contributions that we provide is primarily information on things that are going on that affect their lives. We like to keep them informed on what's going on with the fire department.

4:46 We keep them informed on what's going on with the sheriff's department. And it's really a means for us to get information out that we think is critical. I think the celebration of the 30-year anniversary is important in that it highlights the fact that it's been a successful program. It's a way to foster community. Hi, I'm Marilyn McCall. I'm the Neighborhood Program Coordinator for Clark County. I've been in this position for 10 years. It's really special to be celebrating 30 full years as a Neighborhood Outreach Program. We've gone through a lot of changes and it's good to celebrate how far we've come and the things that we've accomplished and celebrate our volunteers that do such a great job in getting the information out to our community. My experiences with working with the neighborhood organizations has been really great. We have really awesome volunteers in our neighborhood that have started food drives,

5:43 they clean up the parks, they clean up the roads, and all of the organization that they do is all grassroots and it's really fantastic. For more information on the Clark County Neighborhood Program, please visit clark.wa.gov/neighborhoods. Each year, the Assessor's Office identifies and determines the value of all taxable and personal property in the county. Recently, we sat down with Clark County Assessor Peter VanNortwick to discuss how rising property values will impact property owners and learn what types of tax relief options are available. Hello, I'm Jim Demmon with Clark County Close-Up. Thank you so much for meeting with us. Good to be here, Jim. Well, we've done this before, but to remind viewers, what's the role of the County Assessor? Well, the role of the County Assessor, the first thing is to value property for the purpose of taxation.

6:40 That's what most people know the Assessor as. But one of the big roles of the Assessor is actually to protect the taxpayers to make sure that tax districts aren't asking to collect more in property taxes than they're illegally entitled to do. That's called the highest lawful levy, and so that's one of our jobs is to protect that. Once we have the highest lawful levy, then we determine based upon the assessed value what people are going to pay in property taxes. In addition to that, we oversee the annexation process, so if cities are trying to annex property into the city, we oversee that process. And then, of course, we have our senior exemption and current use programs that are state programs but are managed locally in the Assessor's office. So that's kind of in a nutshell what it is that we do. Okay, so let's get into the weeds a little bit. How are property values established?

7:39 Well, property values in the state of Washington, we are told by the state legislature that we are to assess at 100% a market value. That's different than a lot of other states where they have different formulas. In the state of Washington, it's just 100% a market value, but we do what's called mass appraisal, and so what mass appraisal is is that we basically take all the sales, analyze them, put them into a model, and then based upon that model, we then value all the properties. So as I try to explain to people, we're not actually really valuing individual properties, we're really valuing the characteristics of properties based upon the model that is built off of the market sales within the county. And you do that each year? Every single year, yes. Okay. Once the property value is established, then how is the tax rate calculated?

8:36 Well, what happens is a pretty straightforward formula is you take each of the tax district's budget divided by the total assessed value, and that gives us the tax rates. So when we go out and we assess the properties, we know what district they're in, right? And so for each district, we just take all the houses, add up the value, come up with a total assessed value. When the board passes their budget, they have an amount down to the penny that they ask in property taxes, they send us that amount, so it's really a pretty simple division problem. Take their budget, divide it by the total assessed value, that gives us the tax rate, which we then put to a rate per thousand, which is known as a mill rate. But then depending on where you live, you'll have multiple taxing districts, like school districts, a city maybe, county, port, correct?

9:33 Correct, yeah. You'll have, let's see, you may have a city or you may not. If you're not in a city, you're going to have county roads, you may have a fire district. You know, most people have a library district, port districts, school districts, right? All those different ones each have their own budget, and so what's happening in property taxes is really dependent upon which tax districts your particular property happens to be sitting in. Okay, so if you get a higher assessment, does that necessarily mean higher taxes? Not necessarily. What really drives it is what is each of those different tax districts doing? I'll give you a perfect example, right? The battleground school district, they did not pass their levy, so even though people's property values may be going up in battleground, the fact that we're not collecting a levy for the school district this year, this means, right, that portion of their property taxes is basically going down to zero.

10:33 And so, in that case, values are going up, but the amount we're collecting because they didn't pass their levy is going down. Okay. Is there, a couple part question, is there a 1% property tax cap in Washington state, how does this work, and why are sometimes increases above 1%? There is a 1% property tax increase that impacts fire districts, city, library districts, county, and the way that it works is that whatever they could collect the prior year, they are able to increase their collections the next year by 1% plus the value of new construction.

11:16 So, that limits, right, the amount that taxing districts can increase. Now, if a taxing district says, hey, we need more than that 1% plus new construction, what they can do is they can go out to the voters and ask for what's called a levy lid lift, or in the situation of school districts, right, they'll often go out and pass a new levy. They'll be asking for set dollar amounts to be collected over the next four years in property taxes. How could someone check to see other similar property values? So, we have what's called the GIS system, right, so you can go in to look at your property and you can also look at your neighboring properties and kind of see how their assessed values are and look at the tax page and kind of see what the tax rates are in your area.

12:12 So, it's basically within the GIS system, we have a lot of that information, and we also have a place where you can actually go and search for comparable properties to yours in the GIS system to kind of get some sales that are sold. Okay. So, how can, if someone wants to, how can someone appeal their property's assessed value? Well, when they get their assessment notice, you have 60 days to appeal to the board of equalization, and the board of equalization is separate from the assessor's office. You have no control over them. Remember, the board of equalization are appointed by the county council, and so they hear all the property tax appeals, and then, of course, when we go to the board of equalization to defend our values,

13:02 what we're looking at is we look at it as we are defending the rest of the taxpayer's interest in order to make sure that we sustain the values if we feel they are the market value. If we don't feel it's market value, we may never get to the board of equalization because we will adjust it. But because of the way our tax system is set up or our budget-based system, if someone pays less money, then the rest of the taxpayers actually have to pick up those taxes and pay them. So, that's why we care to actually go and defend our assessed values is that there's always a tax shift going on, and we want to make sure everyone is paying for an equal amount of property taxes. Okay. Now, in combination with Washington State, Clark County does offer some property tax deferral and reduction programs. What are some of the tax deferral programs? How do they work, and who can qualify?

14:00 Yeah, we have our current use tax deferrals, which is like farm and agriculture. If you make money from commercial farming property, you're eligible to value what's called the current use of value of agricultural products. And so, that will mean that you'll get lower values on your land values. There's also designated forest land, so people that are out there that are tree farmers, as long as they have five acres of trees, they can get into the designated forest land, and then you have to be actively managing those forests. Because you're doing that, and because there's value to the state overall in these programs, the legislature does offer these programs so that people can get reduction in those taxes.

14:51 And then there's also deferrals for seniors and people that are disabled that don't qualify for the senior exemption program, which I know you're going to ask about later. If you don't qualify for those, you may qualify for a deferral on your taxes, which is basically a loan from the state in order to cover those property taxes. And then, of course, later, when the person passes, then the estate has to pay those property taxes back, but that's only on the senior and disabled person deferral program. Okay, so now let's talk about property tax reduction programs, how do they work, and who can currently qualify. Yeah, so we have the senior exemption and disabled persons exemption program, and to qualify for those, you either have to meet certain qualifications for being disabled or 61 years of age or less.

15:51 Also, there is an income limitation, which this year is 62,000, as long as you make less than 62,000, you meet the other criteria per household. So everything is based upon the prior year, so if in 2025 you made less than 62,000 in your household, you lived in it for six months and you're over 61 years of age, you should qualify for property tax reductions, and if you do, come and contact our office, you can do that online, you can mail in forms, you can come down and visit us, and then we can help get those people on the senior exemption and disabled persons programs. And you help walk people through the process. Yes, we do. Okay, so you talked about you can come in person, web, appointment, all those different things.

16:50 One thing about your office, we ran a story earlier about the joint lobby closure, is your office impacted by the joint lobby closure, and what can people expect? Yeah, so our office is definitely impacted by the joint lobby closure since we are one of the members of the joint lobby, and so during the closure what we're going to be doing is we are going to be taking appointments and we will be seeing taxpayers that need to come in and discuss the senior exemption program. We will be taking those in different spaces within public service center, right, so that we can continue serving those people. The other thing that we're doing is we do outreach where we go out to the different cities, we set up in their city halls, and we set it up so that people can come in and apply,

17:44 and we're doing a number of those this year in each of the cities so that we can go out and serve the people and not make them come down to Vancouver and park in the parking lot, and then go up and try to find where we're doing. So we're trying to do more outreaches to make it as easy for people to apply as possible, and of course everyone can also apply online or mail it in, and so none of those services will actually change. Okay, and I assume all those would be advertised as different sites on your website. Yes. Okay, so now if people want more information about the tax relief programs and those locations, where can they check? They can go to our website, you know, the Clark County Assessor's Office website, and look for tax reduction programs. Yeah, it's clark.wa.gov/assessor. Correct. Okay, well thank you very much for meeting with us.

18:39 Thank you. The Charter Review Commission and its objectives are to review the county charter, determine any pieces that need to be altered or things that might need to be added to kind of make the government function better. We propose amendments, those go to the ballot, and the voters get to decide whether or not those changes go into the charter. I'm Dorothy Gasquet, I represent District 4 on the Charter Review Commission, and we're here today to talk about the charter and why it's important to Clark County. I'm Brandon Erickson, and I'm a member of the Clark County Charter Review Commission. I serve as the chair of the commission, and I represent District 2. As chair of the Charter Review Commission, I'm grateful for the progress that we've made so far. We have reviewed our bylaws in detail.

19:36 And we've also established a very deliberate, transparent, methodical process for how we will review, deliberate upon, and eventually decide upon which amendments we will present to the public for review and consideration. The Charter Review Commission is important because it just really is our ability to, as citizens, to really shape the county government. We really do get to make rules for the council has to follow, we get to change, you know, the way people are elected. And like last time we made the positions nonpartisan, we added the 5th district, and those kind of were really big changes that kind of shaped the way the county government works. Our goal is just to make sure that what we're putting forth to the voters is good, sound policy.

20:30 If the Clark County community wants to get involved with the charter review process, there's a couple ways. I mean, you can reach out to your individual charter review representatives, our emails are all available on our website. You can also do public comment, either written or showing up to our meetings. Our meetings are Wednesdays from 5 to 7. You can also send a written comment and we will read them. The Charter Review Commission is important to me because I love Clark County. I've been a resident here for 30 years, and making important, meaningful changes to our charter can impact day to day life for the citizens of Clark County. For more information on the Clark County Charter Review Commission, please visit clark.wa.gov/counselors/charter-review-commission-2026-2027.

21:26 Youth and Government, a youth program supported by the YMCA, is dedicated to transforming lives through civic engagement and education. Teens are empowered to find their voice and develop leadership skills to be active and engaged servant leaders. On February 18 and 19, students in grades 9 through 12 took part in the annual mock trial court hearings at the Clark County Courthouse. Participants engage with the legal system and in trial advocacy in a variety of roles, including attorneys and witnesses, in a mock trial competition. And usually you only have in these cases about eight witnesses, and they rotate back and forth between civil and criminal cases on a yearly basis.

22:12 But the problems come out every October, and teams of students at various schools, high schools throughout the state and throughout the nation for that matter, get these problems and they work together in a group of a mix of students who will be acting as attorneys, others who will be acting as witnesses, and they are supported by a faculty member or teacher at the school, but then also one or more attorneys who actually coaches them. Students met weekly to explore real-life case law. They learned about the various roles in courtrooms, researched law, and memorized their part for the trial competition. I am an attorney for my team, and I am on the prosecution side, and I have done a lot of research, a lot of book research, online research, to prepare me for being an attorney, and yeah, everything for that.

23:11 And then I play a witness on the same team, and again, there's been a lot of, like I have to read a bunch of statements to prepare for that and do stuff like that, so that's been a lot of work, but it's been really fun. Students are supported by faculty members and actual attorneys who help prepare them for trial. In the courtroom, attorneys sit in the jury section and rate each school on performance. They've got like rating sheets, they use numerical grading to rate the students on their various performances, each aspect of the trial. So when we get done with our competition, the YMCA puts together, they compute all the scores and they determine which team's got the highest rankings. So our top three teams then go on to the state tournament, which takes place in March up in Olympia.

24:06 Some students participating in the mock trials plan to study law in college following graduation. I've been looking at a lot of places, and law is very appealing to me. I plan to go to law school after college, so I am seriously looking into it. But it's also very rewarding to be able to go and do this thing that I will love after the fact, and just enjoy myself and get that experience. Twenty-six teams throughout Washington State participated in the mock trial competition. The winner will go on to national competition. It's realistic in terms of preparation, in terms of reading a witness' statement, and then determining what questions you want to ask to elicit particular types of information from the witness. To get up there and present the case, to argue legal issues in front of a judge, and then present the case both in terms of opening and closing in front of a jury.

25:06 For more information about the mock trial competition, or to submit an interest form for next year, visit seattleymca.org/programs/youthprograms/youthgovernment.

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