WISCONSIN BLUE BOOK


                      Summary of Tax Levies
                                       1940              1941
    SchoolI................... $ 38,753,721       $ 39,148,823
    Local  ...................... 32,960,430        33,487,567
    County   .....................   37,133,195        36,509,103
    State. ......................      871,931            863,836

         Total..................$109,719,277         $110,009,329
  * Includes amount levied for school debt service and for high school tuition.

               Taxation of Public Service Corporations
  The present statutes provides that the Commissioner of Taxation
shall make the ad valorem assessment of the operating property of
each public service company.
  By statute the property of public service corporations must be
assessed at full market value. While real and personal property
are assessed according to the value of each individual description or
parcel, all operating property of a public service corporation, whether
real or personal, and including whatever intangible value that may
exist, is assessed as one item or unit and as personal property.
  After the assessments have been determined, the average state
rate of taxation is applied thereto to determine the taxes which must
be paid directly by the public service corporations to the State
Treasurer. The rate of taxation is an equalized rate determined by
dividing all real and personal property taxes levied locally in the
entire state by the state assessment of general property as deter-
mined by the Department of Taxation.
  In addition to the ad valorem assessments, freight line companies
are assessed a tax based upon 6 percent of gross earnings in this
state, and rural electric cooperative associations are taxed at 3 per-
cent of their gross receipts.
  The statutes provide that after the railroad assessments have been
determined, the Department of Taxation must separately value ter-
minal property used in transferring freight and passengers between
cars and vessels and compute the taxes thereon at the average state
rate. This portion of the total railroad taxes is then remitted by
the State Treasurer to the lakeport cities in which the terminal proper-
ties are located. All other railroad taxes remain in the state treasury
for general state purposes.
  All of the taxes paid by telegraph companies, express companies,
sleeping car companies, and freight line companies also remain in
the state treasury for general state purposes.
   Sixty-five percent of the taxes paid by street railway companies,
the light, heat and power companies, and conservation and regulation
companies is apportioned to the towns, villages, and cities on the
basis of the amount of utility property located and gross business
transacted in each such community. Twenty percent of such taxes
is apportioned to the counties on the same basis, and 15 percent
thereof remains in the state treasury for general state purposes.


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