By:  Diane Benjamin

Property values dropped in 2008.  Some parts of the country got hit worse than others.  Bloomington wasn’t really hurt too bad.  So how did the value of the Pantagraph building drop A Lot?

On 2005 the building was assessed for $958,778.

In 2013 the building was assessed for $400,000!

The real value of the property is the assessed value multiplied by 3.33

The total value of the Pantagraph building dropped from $3,192,731 to $1,200,000 in 8 years?  Hasn’t the City of Bloomington been throwing money at downtown Bloomington?  Haven’t they claimed the assessed value of the area has increased because of it?

Just because the local paper is no longer printed downtown, the value of the building plummeted?

Do all of you realize that because the Pantagraph isn’t paying near as much in taxes as they used to, you are paying more?  In 2006 the Pantagraph paid $72,115.36.  In 2013, they paid $15,969.00.  Local taxing bodies, including schools, got $56,146.36 less!  How was your tax bill for the same time period?

Add that to the Museum of History being assessed at only $31,679 (https://blnnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/history-museum.pdf), taxpayers can’t catch a break!

Here are the screen shots from the County website for the Pantagraph Building:  (Click to enlarge)