13 Oct Does St. Tammany Parish have a lot of Industrial Tax Exemption (ITEP) properties?

Posted at 14:28h in Uncategorized by

ITEP exempts industrial and manufacturing businesses from local ad valorem (property) taxes. However, none of the industries in St. Tammany Parish are the predominant industries who utilize the ITEP credit. St. Tammany is 53rd in per capita ITEP costs.

State law says that all property shall be subject to ad valorem tax unless specifically exempted (La. Const. Art. VII § 18 & 21). For businesses, this includes not only real property, such as their land and buildings, but also personal property, such as machinery and equipment, inventories, furniture and fixtures, etc.

For large, capital-intensive businesses like chemical manufacturing plants, this means that the property taxes owed can account for a significant percentage of the plant’s profits. St. Tammany has  the lowest percentage of taxes paid by business property of all the 64 parishes. Business property accounted for 61.2% of the property taxes collected by Louisiana local governments, in ranging from 26.2% in St. Tammany Parish to 96.5% in Cameron Parish.