Morgan County Clerk Waggener talks not penalizing South Jax for missing tax levy deadline

By Gary Scott on December 29, 2017 at 4:21pm

Despite South Jacksonville failing to file their tax levies before Tuesday’s deadline, the village will not be penalized by the Morgan County Clerk’s office.

By failing to file tax levies for both the village and Road District 15, the village technically violated state law. However, after turning in those tax levies at noon the following day, the Morgan County Clerk’s Office has said they will not penalize the village.

Morgan County Clerk Jill Waggener explains the filing process, as well as what tax levies are used for.

“Every taxing entity in Morgan County has to file a tax levy by 4:30 p.m. the last Tuesday of December. A tax levy is the money that that entity is asking to have on hand to run for the following year,” explains Waggener.

Waggener talks about what the penalty typically is for missing the filing deadline, and her decision not to penalize the village.

“There’s not really a penalty. We’re extending it because sometimes things happen. Everybody is human. In a daily shuffle, with papers on a desk, sometimes things get overlooked and I would never hold on anyone,” says Waggener.

Waggener explains what usually happens when taxing entities miss the levy deadline.

“I believe that you could hold their tax extension the following year, but eventually you’re going to have to catch it up, so it would be a lot of double work for people. So yes, I am being nice, but sometimes you just go with the flow, you accept that things happen and it got overlooked. I called (the village) and (the tax levy) got filed and that’s the bottom line,” Waggener says.

Village Trustees approved the tax levies at their meeting onDecember 7th. Once filed, South Jacksonville’s tax levies were approximately $1-million dollars for the village and for Road District 15, $77-thousand dollars.