Lee County property owners are paying the same real estate tax rate this year as last year: 69 cents for every $100 of assessed value. A year ago, that rate split the Board of Supervisors 3 to 2. This summer, it passed 5 to 0.
The Lee Daily Register compared the board’s minutes from both budget seasons. The other tax rates did not change either, and the budget hearing that drew many speakers in 2025 drew none in 2026.
The rates for 2026-27
The board adopted these rates on June 29, 2026, according to the minutes of that meeting. Each is per $100 of assessed value.
- Real property: $0.69
- Personal property and business personal property: $1.95
- Machinery and tools: $2.00
- Merchants’ capital: $1.41
- Aircraft: $0.10
- Mobile homes: $0.69 (after a July correction, explained below)
At 69 cents, a home assessed at $100,000 owes $690 a year in county real estate tax. A home assessed at $150,000 owes $1,035.
Why 69 cents was a fight in 2025
The 69-cent rate first came with the county’s 2025 reassessment, its first in years. A tax notice read into the minutes of the June 25, 2025 meeting laid out the numbers:
- Total assessed value of real property had risen 46.06% over the year before, not counting new construction or improvements.
- A rate of $0.515 would have raised the same real estate tax as the year before.
- The proposed 69 cents was $0.175 above that, an “effective tax rate increase” of 33.98%.
The old rate had been 74 cents, then-County Administrator Robby Wright told a resident at that hearing. He said the county’s last completed assessment had been in 2016. Brian Hogan, a District 3 resident, summed up the result: the rate was going down, he said, but people would be paying much more tax.
The levies passed that night 3 to 2. Josh Flanary, D.D. Leonard and Roger Waddell voted yes. Mike Kidwell and Brian Shoemaker voted no. The board then adopted a $101,649,644 budget for 2025-26 by the same 3 to 2 split.
A quiet hearing this year
The 2026 public hearing on the budget was held June 18. According to the minutes, the advertised budget totaled $89,624,563, and “there was no public comment.”
On June 29, all five supervisors voted for the rates, for a $90,651,204 budget and for the appropriations. Clint Carter, now the county administrator, said balancing it would take a $3,806 transfer from reserves. He also said $78,354 would be set aside for future opioid abatement projects.
The budget is smaller than last year’s on paper. Comparing this year’s advertised budget with the one in the June 17, 2025 minutes, most of the gap is in two lines: capital projects fell from $7,010,000 to $2,975,000, and the estimate of federal, state and other school money fell from $53,795,875 to $46,169,483. The school estimate was made before the state budget was final, and the board raised the school appropriation twice over the summer.
Two fixes over the summer
The county adopted its budget before the state finished its own. Carter told the board on July 21 that the state did not finalize its budget until the last week of June, so the county had worked from its best information.
That July meeting also fixed the mobile home rate. The levies adopted in June, like those in 2025, had listed mobile homes at 74 cents. Carter said it should have been 69 cents. According to the July 21 minutes, he said the Treasurer’s and Commissioner of the Revenue’s offices had handled it correctly under state code for the past fiscal year, and the board re-adopted the levies at 69 cents for the public’s understanding. The vote was 5 to 0.
Carter put the final budget at $91,059,580 that night. The appropriation resolution printed in the same minutes totals $90,691,570.
The second fix was for school security. On August 18, the board added $1,877,156 to the school budget: $1,535,326 in state money that needed a $341,830 local match. The August 18 minutes say the Department of Criminal Justice Services had told the school board on July 15 that it would not renew the grant for school security officers at the elementary and middle schools.
To keep those officers, the school board agreed to dissolve its Capital Reserve Fund and return the money to the county’s general fund, Carter said. That let the supervisors fund the larger package. Nobody spoke at the public hearing, and the vote was 5 to 0. The school appropriation rose from $53,417,201 to $55,294,357.
An idea for taxing big landholdings
The same August meeting heard a pitch to change who carries the tax load. Adam Malle of the Clinch Coalition, which is working with the Appalachian Citizens’ Law Center and Appalachian Voices, asked the board to support state legislation that would let coal counties create a separate tax class for large land holdings.
Citing a land-ownership tool developed by the University of Tennessee and Open Grid Data, Malle said more than 8.5% of Lee County’s 272,957 acres is owned by 10 landowners. Much of that land was assembled for mining, he said, and is now assessed low because there are few comparable sales, which pushes more of the tax onto residents and businesses. The August minutes record his request but no vote on it.