Find Out How Your Tax Dollars Are Spent

Gwinnett County officials hope a feature on the new webpage will help residents better understand how their tax dollars are spent. Titled Where Your Property Taxes Go and accessed from the Your Money button on the home page, the new interactive feature offers a property tax calculator that shows how the money is divvied up. It also provides specific examples of how the services are provided to county residents. Officials said it is part of the county’s attempt to increase the transparency of its financial activities.

“We hope that the property tax calculator will inform property owners about how much they pay in county taxes and what they get for their money,” Gwinnett County Commission Chairman Charlotte Nash said in a press release. “I am confident that most of us will be surprised at all the services provided through our property taxes.”

Residents can access the information in the property tax calculator by searching for a specific property or entering a fair market value. This can be done for both residential and commercial properties. The property can by found by entering one of the following options: a physical address, a mailing address, a parcel identification number or the name of the property owner. The calculator will return an estimate of the total property taxes and fees paid based upon the most recent bill, including a pie chart showing how the taxes were allocated to each of the functions and activities of the county government.

The fair market value option displays estimated county, state and school taxes but does not include fees, city taxes, or exemptions, which are unique to individual property owners.