Stafford County residents will get another reprieve on their Personal Property and Real Estate taxes.
At a joint meeting of the Stafford County Board of Supervisors and the county’s School Board today, Supervisors decided to waive late temporarily and interest for late tax payments. Residents can pay the taxes due on December 5, as late as Jan. 29, 2021, without facing a penalty.
According to county documents, this emergency ordinance was requested by the County’s Treasurer, Laura Rudy, due to the region’s escalation of coronavirus cases. Rudy also considered the possibility of once again having to close county offices similar to what happened last, due to the virus. However, such closures have been announced.
“I’m pleased that the citizens that have had to deal with the uncertainty of this entire pandemic will be afforded this extra time. Citizens have been asking if the board was going to do this but we uncertain since we didn’t know we’d still be in this nine months later. Hopefully it will relieve some undue stress that some of our citizens are dealing with due to the pandemic,” said County Treasurer Laura Rudy.
Stafford County passed similar emergency ordinances back in May when the zeroed out late fees and penalties for personal property and utilities taxes. The board did the same for county real estate taxes back in June as well.
While there is nothing in the Virginia State Code that gives the Board of Supervisors authority to waive interest and late fees completely, but it does have some leeway on setting a minimum fee. The State Code does have a set maximum amount that can be charged for failure to pay taxes there is no set minimum for payment.
Because of this Stafford County can through passing an ordinance temporarily set at $0/0% as they have once again.
The Board of Supervisors has the authority to extend the waiver should ti choose to do so.
