A little history about Utah’s property tax laws sheds light on how we’ve arrived at our current situation. The current “Truth in Taxation” process came about due to increasing citizen concerns about the way local governments had been levying property taxes during a period from 1970 until the mid-1980s during which assessed property values had increased rapidly, averaging 13 percent per year. This situation provided a windfall to some local governments with tax revenues increasing faster than actual cost of services.
The 1985 Tax Increase Disclosure Act created a revenue-based tax system to replace the rate-based system and mandated a process to involve citizens if entities want to raise property taxes.
Utah Foundation’s “The Essential Tax — Property Tax 2018” explains the current situation this way:
“In theory, Truth in Taxation dictates that the property tax should generate the same revenue every year. However, there are two ways revenues can change. The first is that any new growth (like a new subdivision) would be taxed at the current rate, theoretically allowing growth in revenue commensurate with the new services required by the new subdivision.
The second way to increase revenue would be to increase the tax rate (or even just leave it the same) by going through the Truth in Taxation process.”