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Tax |
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At a Glance |
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Director |
Mike Middleton |
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Employees |
8 |
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Number of tax accounts |
189,000+ |
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1997 ad valorem taxes to be collected |
$118,476,000 |
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Sale of hunting and fishing licenses |
$419,040 |
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Redemption of sold or adjudicated property |
$1,242,768 |
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Tax Sale collections |
$1,230,228 |
Tax
Telephone: 318-677-6638
e-mail: cpsotax@iamerica.net
A new Tax Division director was appointed in January 1998. Our continuing intent is to always be mindful of the needs of all users of the Sheriff’s Tax Division -- the taxpayer and the various entities we serve. Renewed emphasis is placed on ensuring that users have all their questions answered and that their accounts are accurate. As in any business, taxpaying customers have full rights to know and expect accuracy in all matters affecting their business.
The Sheriff’s Tax Division, acting on behalf of the Sheriff in his capacity as Ex-Officio Tax Collector of Caddo Parish, collects ad valorem taxes for and makes distribution of the revenues to 32 entities. Among the entities for which the Sheriff collects taxes are the Caddo Parish School Board, the Caddo Parish Treasurer, the Red River Waterway, the Caddo Levee District, the Caddo-Bossier Port Commission and the nine Caddo Parish Fire Districts.
The Sheriff’s Office is one of three tax-gathering agencies within the parish The City of Shreveport collects its own ad valorem taxes and the Sales and Use Tax Commission receives and distributes all sales and use taxes collected in the parish.
To complement delivery of our services, we are working with computer software programmers to "perfect" our 1996 purchased software to allow quicker and more user-friendly input and output of the vast information that is kept on each of the more than 189,000 tax accounts.
We are proud of the overall findings on our most recent audit conducted by an outside auditing firm. There was no hint of mishandling of funds in any way -- in addition to honest and capable employees, we owe this largely to the vastly improved software program we are now running on the host IBM AS400 computer.
We strive to ensure each taxpayer receives a tax statement each year to lessen the possibility of the property being sold at a tax sale. We ask that anyone who has not received a tax notice by December 5 of each year call or e-mail the Tax Division so we can remedy the problem.
In 1997, tax notices were not deliverable for more than 3,000 properties in the parish because an accurate change of address had not been filed with the Caddo Parish Tax Assessor’s Office -- a completely separate agency from the Sheriff’s Office and its Tax Division.
Anyone who did not receive a tax notice last year should call the Sheriff’s Tax Division.
We ask all citizens to be mindful of the large volumes of telephone and counter traffic between November and May -- please understand this and have patience while we work to give everyone full service while minimizing our overall staffing.