As the time draws close for the county government and local school boards to set the millage rate for property owners in Chattooga County, local officials are busy finishing up the tax digest.

The tax digest is the official benchmark to determine property value for taxation by local governments.  In Georgia, property is required to be assessed at 40% of the fair market value unless otherwise specified by law.

Chattooga County Tax Commissioner Joy Hampton told WZQZ News this week that she is currently working with the Assessor’s Office to get the final digest numbers and move forward to getting the 2021 tax bills ready to be sent out.

Hampton says that she has collected 99.59% of the taxes due in 2019 and 97.63% of the taxes due in 2020.