COUNTY ASSESSOR'S OFFICE PASSES MUSTER.

Byline: Jesse Hiestand Daily News Staff Writer

Understaffed and mired in a backlog of work, the county Assessor's Office nonetheless received a largely favorable review during a recent state audit of its management and assessment practices.

Compared with counties with assessment rolls of similar size, Ventura County ranked low or the lowest in all categories of staffing while ranking high or highest in terms of workload, according to the report.

``We commend the assessor's staff for accomplishing so much despite a severely reduced staff and an increasing workload,'' said the report by the state Board of Equalization.

Assessor Glenn E. Gray said many of the report's 19 recommendations have already been put into effect since state officials completed a five-month review in November. The final report was released last week.

``It's just constructive criticism and I don't have any problem with that,'' Gray said. ``The most frustrating thing is that we just don't have the manpower or money to implement everything they want done.''

Chief among the recommendations is having enough employees to do the work and complete all mandatory audits.

``I don't think there's much we can do until the Board of Supervisors and county comes up with more money,'' he said.

Budget cuts reduced the assessor's staff from a high of 149 in 1991 to a low of 96 staffers two years ago, he said. The office currently has 106 employees.

Gray said he will continue to rely on a state program that loans the Assessor's Office money on the condition it be used to meet certain goals, such as hiring additional employees to eliminate a backlog.

The state does this to ensure the continued receipt of property tax revenue, which in turn is used for schools, he said. If a county meets its goals, the loan is written off.

This was first done in Ventura County last year. The county is again ``borrowing'' $1.4 million from the state this year, allowing it to hire 25 more auditors, he said.

This time the goal is to complete about half of the 70,000 overdue appraisals of properties that have dropped below their originally assessed value.

In a situation where values are in decline, the Assessor's Office is required to reassess the property every year, which adds to the caseload. Properties that increase in value need only be reappraised when they undergo construction or a change in ownership.

These extra reassessments started to become a problem when the recession of the early 1990s drove down many property values, Gray said.

The Assessor's Office also has a backlog of about 2,000 appeals where property owners are contesting the amount of an appraisal, and about 250 unfinished cases where businesses with more than $300,000 property have not been reappraised in the required time, once every four years.

County assessors recently announced that the local economy appears to be picking up steam, as evident in a 3.27 percent increase in the county's total valuation - $45.89 billion - for 1997-98, compared to the previous year.

This could also add to the workload as more homes are bought, sold or built, Gray said.

``If the economy picks up and real estate takes off, the workload will really increase,'' he said.

Still, Gray does not expect the situation to become dire.

He said his office was not seriously impacted by the loss of $159,300 or 2 percent of its $7.9 million budget as part of the county's effort to balance its own budget earlier this month. That money came out of a trust fund set aside to cover automating the office with computers, he said.

Many of the state recommendations though do not require the direct outlay of any more funds, he said.

Among those recommendations:

Apply appropriate penalties for failure to file a change of ownership statement in a timely manner.

Assess landscaping as new construction on newly constructed and recently transferred residential properties.

Develop a program for cooperating with local fire departments in identifying properties that may have been damaged or destroyed in a disaster.

Revise the program for assessing manufactured homes to include an annual review for decline in value.

Annually appraise aircraft and all boats at market value.

Require certain vessel owners to file annual vessel property statements and penalize nonfiling owners.