Appraisal districts are governmental agencies as created and defined by statute. Tax Code section 6.01 says:DWA wrote:Appraisal districts are not government agencies. They are a agency created to represent governments. They do not have to follow the same guidelines with respect to weapons that a city or county government would.
The appraisal districts determine the value of property. They give that information to cities and counties who then assess and collect taxes. If you fail to pay taxes, you are in trouble with the CITY OR COUNTY ASSESSOR and NOT the APPRAISER. Why? Because appraisal districts do not have that governmental power - and do not collect taxes.
They are a separate business whose clients are all government agencies. Cities or counties are not required to use their valuation services, although most do. As an example, the City of Arlington has their own appraisal staff and they do not use the valuations from the Tarrant Appraisal District.
Any policies they have are valid. They may control security on their property as they see fit, just as a private business would.
[/quote]Sec. 6.01. APPRAISAL DISTRICTS ESTABLISHED. (a) An appraisal district is established in each county.
(b) The district is responsible for appraising property in the district for ad valorem tax purposes of each taxing unit that imposes ad valorem taxes on property in the district.
(c) An appraisal district is a political subdivision of the state.[/quote]
You re correct that the appraisal district's job is to appraise property and not to levy taxes. This was created and set up this way to eliminate the complaints of each taxing unit appraising the property for themselves and coming up with different values. For example, in the 70s, a house could be valued at 70,000 by a city, 80,000 by the county, and 125,000 by the school district. Having a single unit responsible for appraising without having any taxing authority was supposed to provide a more accurate appraisal because the appraisal district did not benefit in any way from fudging the appraisals.
Arlington does use the Tarrant Appraisal District values by law. If you have reason to think they are not doing so, please contact the attorney general's office or other appropriate law enforcement to let them know. A quick simple way to check would be to take the tax bill from the city and compare it tot he appraisal notice you received from the appraisal district. If the values are not matching, there is a legal problem.