Scrutiny over assessor’s office budget leads to reductions

Three weeks ago the Jasper County Conference Board demanded the county assessor scrap her entire FY26 budget and restart from scratch after concerns were raised about the office’s supposedly high reserve funds, staff raises, the amount of deputies needed in the office and whether line items were “spitballed.”

By the following week, the conference board — which is comprised of town mayors, county supervisors and a representative from the school boards in Jasper County — met again with the county assessor to review her new budget, which was reduced by about $20,000. The meeting was over rather quickly.

However, the previous meeting on March 18 was much longer, and it was because Baxter Mayor Doug Bishop and Supervisor Brandon Talsma wanted the assessor to explain items in her budget. When they asked for specifics, she couldn’t answer. When they asked for estimates, she couldn’t answer.

“It seems like we’re spitballing a lot of these numbers,” Bishop said, noting line items like FICA, IPERS and health insurance were rounded to $25,000 and $31,000 and $90,000, respectively. He suggested every department in the county is notified of these amounts — to the penny — by the auditor’s office staff.

County Assessor Stacey Von Dielingen said whatever doesn’t get spent, it gets offset for next year’s budget. Bishop had his doubts. He saw no offset from this year to the next year, except for software and maintenance. Talsma grew aggravated with her not knowing estimates for reserves and other line items.

Bishop later pointed out that he knew a rough estimate of her reserves balance, which he estimated to be above $200,000. To him, it is “crazy” to see a reserve balance that high when the assessor’s office budget is around $653,000. It is common practice for taxing entities to have at least 25 percent reserves.

Going by these estimates, the assessor’s office would have 30 percent of its budget in reserve; 25 percent reserves amounts to about $163,000.

Frustrations only continued.

Bishop scrutinized line items for mileage reimbursements and continued education trainings, and he disagreed with her going against county policy and staying in Des Moines hotels for trainings. He said Von Dielingen spent $2,888 on hotels in Des Moines over the past two years.

Pushing back, Von Dielingen said her office operates autonomously from the county and does not have to adhere to those policies. She defended staying in Des Moines, saying she gets anxious driving in rush hour traffic in the mornings and can study better by herself in a hotel room.

Von Dielingen wished they had talked to her and asked her questions ahead of time so that she could be better prepared to give a response. Bishop noted he did not get the packet of budget information until that very morning, and that it is also his job as a conference board member to hold her accountable.

“I’ll be honest with you, I was a bit chafed when I saw the deputy assessor’s pay up there, because I think everyone here had a full understanding of where we are at,” Bishop said of a deputy assessor’s salary, which had been bumped up from $63,829 to $73,787, despite the board thinking it would be much less.

Earlier on in the meeting, the Jasper County Conference Board voted to correct that. Von Dielingen apologized and said it wasn’t specified originally in a motion at a past meeting. Bishop said the members of the conference board have an obligation to their taxpayers to point out these discrepancies.

“I refuse to sit here and be made to feel bad because I’m asking questions,” he said. “I think I have a statutory duty to sit here and ask these questions.”

Von Dielingen added, “You’re asking for me to give you figures I can’t give you because you haven’t asked me ahead of time. So I don’t have the budget in front of me and the figures that I have done from my budget because you didn’t ask me ahead of time to prepare them, or I would have had those for you.”

While Bishop was not accusing the county assessor of any wrongdoing or being deceitful, he did not believe the budget was a true reflection of the numbers. He made a motion for the county assessor to start again from scratch and hold another public hearing on the final budget. It received unanimous support.

Von Dielingen later commented on the March 18 meeting in a statement: “There was a unique situation with the budget this year following the first meeting that was discussed at the public hearing, and in looking at that change there were several other line items that board members had a question about.”

Which was when the board decided to set another meeting to allow the assessor’s office to provide updated figures and to lower the budget in those areas the conference board mentioned. Von Dielingen said it was a unique situation because the budget was already approved.

Since the changes to the budget only resulted in a decrease, the conference board was able to approve the newly amended budget on March 25. Von Dielingen said the Jasper County Assessor’s Office strives to set an efficient budget each year and still provide taxpayers with the best service possible.

“With changes possible at the state level there is no way to know this year what effect this could have on the office’s budgeting ability going forward,” Von Dielingen said in her statement to Newton News. “But we will continue to work keeping our levy well below the limit allowed by law.”