BUCKHANNON – File your personal property assessment without stepping a foot into the Upshur County Courthouse, and no, Upshur County Assessor Dustin Zickefoose isn’t talking about online filing, although residents can do that, too.
The Upshur County Assessor’s office has set up a table outside the courthouse where any Assessor’s office business can be done. Zickefoose said his office started setting up the table last week to reduce traffic inside the courthouse.
“We are taking assessment forms, selling dog tags, taking farm applications, commercial returns — basically anything in the office or anything you need to do is all right here,” Zickefoose said. “We’re doing this to minimize exposure and just trying to get people flowing quicker. I think we’re concerned about a possible bottleneck with the security and paying taxes.”
The table will be set up for three days a week, weather permitting, and Zickefoose said they may continue to set up the table through August. Personal property assessments for the prior calendar year may be filed beginning July 1, 2020, and the deadline to file is Oct. 1, 2020. Personal property assessments establish a fair market value for all real and personal property and provide it to the levying body, i.e. the county.
“We may try to do it through August if everything’s working okay because we really get busy toward the end of August; that’s when we get a big influx of people,” Zickefoose said.
The Assessor’s office also sells dog tags that help the dog catcher identify dogs without a phone number or address.
“If you are in the county, it’s $3 for a tag and if you’re in the city it’s $6 per tag,” Zickefoose said. “We take the information, we send the tag home and a number is assigned to it and if the dog catcher or anybody needs to, we can track the dog that way if the dog doesn’t have a name and address on its collar.”
The Assessor’s office is still open if people prefer to conduct business inside the courthouse, but Zickefoose said people have liked the table outside.
“This is just another option if they don’t want to wait outside,” he said. “You can go inside and we’re still operating as normal. This is just an added an added convenience and people seem to like it; they walk up and they’re happy to get right back in their car and go.”
He said people can also still call his office or file assessments online here.
