Mistakenly Valued Ind. House Strains Budget

A house that was mistakenly valued at $400 million may have been the cause of a number of budget shortfalls and layoffs in northwest Indiana, The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports.

Sharon Lippens, director of Porter County, Ind.’s IT and service department, said an outside user may have caused the problem by unintentionally altering the value of the house in Valparaiso, Ind.

The house had been valued at $121,900 before the incident, The Post-Intelligencer reports.

According to Jim Murphy, Porter County treasurer, the home carried roughly $1,500 in property taxes.  In 2006, it was billed for around $8 million, The Post-Intelligencer reports.

Lippens says her department found the mistake and has taken measures to correct it; however, the $400 million number was used in the tabulations to determine tax rates.  As a result of the glitch, 18 government taxing units in the county were notified that they’d need to return tax dollars to the tune of $3.1 million.  The Valparaiso school system found itself with a budget shortfall of $200,000, and the city is down $9,000, The Post-Intelligencer reports.

Last week, city officials acknowledged that the mistake could lead to a number of cost-cutting measures, including rounds of layoffs, according to the Post-Intelligencer.

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