Connie Phillips - (269) 637-0747
Deputy City Assessor

Office Hours: 8:00 a.m. - 12:00 noon and 1:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.
Other hours by appointment

The City Assessor is a contracted position. Douglas Brousseau is the City Assessor and is in the office one day per week. Questions concerning property assessments should be addressed to the Deputy Assessor, Connie Phillips, at (269) 637-0747.

The Assessor's Office is responsible for the equitable distribution of the property tax burden under current law, for maintaining ownership records for the City of South Haven real and personal property and for administration of the Board of Review.

The office of the Assessor is able to provide the following information for property located within the City limits of South Haven:

• Property identification number
  
• Property address
  
• Taxpayer name
  
• Taxpayer address
  
• Owner name (if different than taxpayer)
  
• Lot size
  
• Year built
  
• Square footage
  
• Land description
  
• Property maps
  
• State equalized value
  
• Taxable value
  
• Homestead exemption information
  

Effects of Proposal A:

Proposal A, which passed on March 15, 1994, placed a limit on the value used to compute property taxes. Prior to 1994, the State Equilized Value (SEV) was multiplied by the Millage rate to compute a tax bill. Today's tax bill is computed by multiplying Taxable Value (TV) times the millage rate.

Property that has been continuously owned and no new construction since the passage of Proposal A will have a Taxable Value comprised of the 1994 SEV times the past seven years' Consumer Price Indexes. The Taxable Value must not exceed one-half of the Market Value and in most cases will be less than one-half of the Market Value, with this beneficial gap widening each year.

The Taxable Value may not increase annually by more than 5% or by the Consumer Price Index, whichever is less. The two exceptions to this limitation are transfer of ownership and new construction. If a transfer of ownership occurred in the prior year, the current Taxable Value is equal to the current State Equalized Value. New construction, other than normal maintenance and repairs, will raise the Taxable Value by the contributory market value of the improvements.

Also included in the passage of Proposal A was the creation of a Homestead Exemption. This exemption applies to those homeowners who own and occupy their home as their principle residence as of May 1. The homestead exemption removes the obligation of paying the school operating portion of the tax bill.

Note: For properties located in Allegan County, the millage rates for county services for Non-Homestead and Homestead properties are 4.6577 for Operations (Summer), .9998 for Roads (Winter) and .2399 for Senior Services (Winter).