PARSONS – James ‘Chris’ Michael brings a wealth of knowledge and experience as the new Tucker County Assessor.

Michael was elected as the assessor during the November general election.

“I started here in 1994 as the Tucker County Appraiser for about 10 years,” Michael said. “I was also a Tucker County Commissioner for six years. After that I went to the West Virginia State Tax Department in Charleston where I monitored approximately 15 counties. An opportunity came up in Morgantown, and for the last three years, I was the commercial appraiser for Morgantown in Monongalia County.”

Tuesday was his first day working back in Tucker County. He said the assessor is really a glorified record-keeper.
“We take care of all of the property transfers and property splits, we value all real estate and we take care of the managed timber land,” Michael said. “We also take care of the mineral accounts, read deeds and essentially, we keep the records for who owns what.”

Michael said his office is in charge of all the mapping for property.

“People can come in and actually see the boundaries and different things of that nature,” Michael said. “We do value property, but we do not do the taxes. The County Commission, school board and municipalities set the tax rates.”

He said his office is also in charge of all personal property including cars, automobiles and such.

“So you can see, record-keeping is the main part of our job,” he said. “We also go out every year and pick up on the new construction. Every three years, we see every piece of property in the county and we stop and talk to the people.”

Michael said the Tucker County Assessor’s Office is in good shape.

“We have kept up on our three year plan,” Michael said. “Everything is almost in the system and we are finishing up our mobile homes. We still have to do some mineral linking. We are going to look at our final property values that Greg has been working on and we will see where we are.”

One goal Michael said he hopes the Assessor Office will complete is to have all of the county’s maps online by the end of the year.

“I don’t know exactly where we are at this point, but we hope to complete that,” Michael said. “I have a staff of five. Andrew (Meador) mainly works on IT and programing and does our mapping; Greg (Stevens) and Roger (Cale) do the real estate work in the office and the field, and figure out the real estate values; and Marina (Wolford) and Shawn (Marker) take care of the personal property and property transfers and new splits.”

Michael said working in different areas has given him a little bit different perspective of the assessor position.

“In the 15 counties I have worked in, everyone ends up in about the same place, but there is a little different ways you can take to get there,” Michael said. “In Monongalia County we had to revise and revamp some procedures a little bit each year. We will probably look at the same thing here. Our idea is to make it a little bit better for the taxpayer and a little better for the people actually doing the work. If we can save time and get a little more efficient, maybe we can save some money and everyone likes that.”

Some important dates to remember include personal property individual forms are due Oct. 1 and business property forms are due by Sept. 1. Farm reports are due by Sept. 1 and applications for the homestead exemption must be filed July 1 through Dec. 1.

The Tucker County Assessor Office is located at 215 First St. in Parsons on the second floor of the Tucker County Courthouse. The office is open from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday.
Additional information is available by calling 304-478-3727, ext. 206.