Release Date: Jan. 16, 2002
Contacts: 

Rosann Doran
Public Information Officer
303.438.6308 

Tonya Haas
Associate City Manager
303.438.6355

Your property tax bill has arrived, and you’d like to know how the government calculates the amount you have to pay, right?

And what’s the story behind the tax rate decrease Broomfield has instituted?

During the early phases of the transition to the City and County of Broomfield, estimates put the county mill levy rate at approximately 21.234 mills. A mill is $1 for every $1,000 in value.

Recognizing that property values had increased throughout Broomfield an average of nearly 22 percent during the 2001 reappraisal effort, city leaders lowered both the county and city mill levies in an attempt to prevent an increased property tax bill for most property owners.

Total property taxes collected aren’t just for the city and county. They include the levies of school districts and other special districts over which Broomfield officials have no control (fire rescue, urban drainage, metropolitan districts, etc.). Regardless, most Broomfield homeowners won’t see an increase in their total property tax bills over last year. In some instances, homeowners are even paying less.

In some areas of Broomfield, though, property values increased much more than the average 22 percent. In those cases an increased property tax bill is likely, despite Broomfield’s lowered county mill levy, which is below that of any of the four surrounding counties.

If Broomfield had not become a combined city and county, taxpayers living in Broomfield would be paying their former county’s mill levy, as well as the city’s previous mill levy of 13.894. Because Broomfield was able to consolidate city and county functions and localize service delivery, it was able to lower both the city and county mill levy amounts.

Below is a table comparing what a taxpayer in the City and County of Broomfield with a home valued at $250,000 will be paying to the City and County, and what that same homeowner would have paid to the predecessor county and the City of Broomfield had consolidation not occurred.

To calculate the "with and without consolidation" difference for any home in Broomfield, here’s the equation:

Market value of home X .0915 = Assessed value (In Colorado, residential property is only taxed at approximately 9.15 percent of its market value.)

Multiply this by .028968 (Broomfield City and County levies combined)

or X .031515 (Boulder County +City of Broomfield)

or X .037435 (Adams County + City of Broomfield)

or X .036310 (Jefferson County + City of Broomfield)

In addition to the City and County mill levies, tax bills also include property taxes levied by other taxing entities. In fact, school district mill levies often account for close to half, if not more, of most property tax bills.

For the same Broomfield Heights home with a market value of $174,000 (assessed value of $15,921) the levies are as follows:

Tax bills vary widely throughout the City and County due to other district mill levies. Below are just three school district mill levies, and the effect they have on a home valued at $250,000: