Campbell County property owners will see a slightly lower county tax rate this year, marking the sixth consecutive year the fiscal court has reduced the rate.
The Campbell County Fiscal Court approved a 2026 real property ad valorem tax rate of 15.2 cents per $100 of assessed property value, down from 15.3 cents last year at its meeting on Wednesday. Though the county tax rate is going down, it is just one part of a property owner’s tax bill, so it doesn’t guarantee that everyone will pay less.
Campbell County Commissioner Brian Painter said the decrease is small this year but continues a trend established by the fiscal court.
“It’s cumulative relief for our taxpayers,” Painter said. “It’s nothing big this time. It’s only 0.1, going from 15.3 to 15.2, but still, I think it shows the right direction that the court has headed over these last six years.”
Ad valorem taxes are taxes based on the assessed value of property. At Campbell County’s new rate, the county’s portion of the tax on a property assessed at $100,000 would be $152. A property assessed at $200,000 would generate $304 in county real property taxes.
The fiscal court selected what Kentucky calls the “compensating tax rate,” which is calculated annually using property assessments.
Under Kentucky law, the compensating rate is generally designed to produce approximately the same amount of revenue from property that existed the previous year. When the overall assessed value of existing property increases, the compensating rate can decrease to offset that growth. New property is excluded from that calculation, meaning local governments can receive additional revenue as new property is added.
That distinction also means a lower county tax rate does not guarantee every Campbell County property owner will pay less.
Campbell County Judge/Executive Steve Pendery acknowledged that some property owners could still pay more if their property’s assessed value has increased.
“Yes, the rate has been going down,” Pendery said. “There’s probably an increase in the amount paid for some people, and that gets pointed out fairly regularly that the assessments are going up.”
For example, a home assessed at $200,000 under last year’s 15.3-cent rate would generate $306 in county taxes. If that property’s assessment increased to $220,000 this year, the new 15.2-cent rate would generate $334.40, an increase of $28.40 despite the lower tax rate.
In addition to the county’s tax rate, Kentucky property tax bills can include separate rates levied by the state, county, school district and other local taxing districts, such as libraries, fire districts, extension districts and soil conservation districts. Those entities establish their own rates.
That is particularly relevant this year for taxpayers within the Campbell County School District.
The Campbell County Board of Education proposed increasing its real estate tax rate from 64.3 cents per $100 of assessed value for 2025-2026 to 65.2 cents. The proposed rate is designed to generate 4% more property tax revenue than the previous year from existing property, while the district would also receive revenue generated by new property.
If adopted, the school district’s higher rate could contribute to an increase in a property owner’s overall tax bill even as the county’s portion decreases.
Pendery said the fiscal court’s approach over the past six years has been to limit how much additional property tax revenue the county collects.
“For the last six years, we are taking less than the amount of money that we need to keep up with inflation, which essentially is a tax cut,” Pendery said. “We’ve been doing that at least, and also a couple years in there, we’ve taken in less money than we did the year before.”
