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Mountain Home property owners will pay the city the same 2 mills next year that they have paid for years, if the City Council approves a routine levy resolution at its meeting Thursday.
The council meets at 5 p.m. in the Council Chambers at 720 Hickory St. Along with the levy, members will consider a small annexation along U.S. Highway 62/412 and may return to a proposed ordinance that would set fees the city has been charging without one.
The levy resolution is the same request the city makes every fall, and the way it works is a good illustration of where city government ends and county government begins. The council sets the rate. Every other step, from valuing the property to mailing the bill to cashing the check, belongs to the county.
Under Act 585 of 1971, the council authorizes a 2-mill tax on property inside the city limits, assessed in 2026 and collected in 2027. Arkansas cities can levy up to 5 mills for general purposes without a vote of the people, so Mountain Home is asking for less than half of what the law allows.
The city has no tax office, so the resolution directs the Baxter County clerk and collector to put the 2 mills on the county’s books and collect it on the city’s behalf. Once the council votes, City Clerk Scott Liles will certify the levy in a letter to County Judge Kevin Litty. The county has asked every taxing unit in Baxter County to have its request in by Oct. 30.
That is where the Quorum Court comes in. State law requires the county’s legislative body to levy all property taxes in the county at one time, and Baxter County has that meeting set for Dec. 1. The Quorum Court does not set the city’s rate or debate it. It adopts what the city certified, just as it adopts the millage voters approved for the Mountain Home School District and the county’s own general and road millage.
From there the work falls to four elected county officers who are not city employees. Assessor Jayme Nicholson’s office sets the assessed value of each property, which in Arkansas is 20% of market value. Clerk Canda Reese’s office keeps the tax books. Collector Teresa Smith’s office mails the bills in 2027 and takes the payments. Treasurer Jenay Mize’s office passes the city’s share back to Mountain Home.
The bill a homeowner receives from the collector’s office bundles every levy into one number, which is where much of the confusion starts. The school district’s millage is the largest share, followed by the county’s, with the city’s 2 mills a small slice at the bottom.
A mill is $1 for every $1,000 of assessed value. For a home worth $200,000, the assessed value is $40,000 and the city’s 2 mills comes to $80 a year before the state homestead credit. The property owner pays that to the county collector, not to City Hall.
Last year’s certification letter from Liles to Litty described the city’s request as identical to those of previous years.
The annexation would bring four parcels totaling about 2.3 acres into the city at the intersection of Highway 62/412 and County Road 390, along with the adjoining rights-of-way. Hometown Commons LLC and Rick Hoover Properties LLC filed the petition, which Rick Hoover signed as a member of both companies. The signatures were notarized in Howell County, Missouri.
The petition went through the county first. Litty signed an order Aug. 28 finding it met the requirements of state law for a 100% owner annexation, including a title company letter verifying ownership, a surveyor’s certification that the land touches the city limits without creating an enclave, and a letter from the Arkansas GIS Office approving the legal description.
The ordinance would place the property in Ward 1 and zone it Commercial C-2C. Billboards already on the land would be grandfathered in, though any that are torn down or removed would fall under the city sign ordinance. The city commits to extending police, fire and sewer service within three years. Attorney Ted Sanders will present the item, and it would take effect 30 days after passage.
The packet does not say what Hoover plans to build on the property.
The third item is the petition fee ordinance that got its first reading Sept. 17. Liles told the council then that the Building Department had asked where the city adopted its fees for lot splits, subdivision plats and large-scale development plans, and that he could not find any ordinance setting them. The proposal would formalize those fees and raise most of them, with a subdivision plat going from $75 to $200 and a large-scale development plan from $25 to $200.
Council members asked to see what similar cities charge before taking a second reading. Liles said in an email announcing the agenda that he was still collecting those numbers and that the item would likely be tabled to Oct. 15 if he could not finish in time.
The council will also approve minutes from the Sept. 17 meeting, hear committee reports and review bank reconciliations. Committee minutes in the packet show the Street Department has closed out its work at the Community Center at $3,061,895.51, is finishing the fishing piers and walkway at the McCabe Park pond ahead of the Oct. 10 Don Webb fishing derby, and has begun a full rebuild of Langston Street from Redbud Street to Highway 62.
The Fire Department reported 368 calls in August, up from 277 in August 2025, and 2,616 calls for the year through August compared to 2,353 a year ago.
The meeting is open to the public and is usually streamed on Facebook and YouTube by XL7-TV.
