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Sussex County property tax dollars are being spent more effectively than New Castle, Kent County property tax dollars, according to a new study released by the financial information firm, SmartAsset.
To find the places where people are getting the most for their property tax dollars, the study looked at school rankings, crime rates and property taxes for all three counties in Delaware.
As a way to measure the quality of schools, they calculated the average math and reading/language arts proficiencies for all the school districts in the country. Within each state, these schools were then ranked between 1 and 10 (with 10 being the best) based on those average scores.
For each county, SmartAsset’ calculated the violent and property crimes per 100,000 residents.
Using the school and crime numbers, they calculated a community score. This is the ratio of the school rank to the combined crime rate per 100,000 residents.
The study used the number of households, median home value and average property tax rate to calculate a per capita property tax collected for each county.
Finally, they calculated a tax value by creating a ratio of the community score to the per capita property tax paid.
Some of the economic differences among counties were not calculated in the study.
On Tuesday June 12, the New Castle County Council voted to raise property taxes by 15% for residents and businesses phased in over two years.