Opinion ID: 2287933
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Local or Distributable Property

Text: In their third point, KCPL and the assessor argue that an assessor is not under a ministerial duty to assess a temporarily offline power plant as local property. The plaintiffs alleged in counts III and IV that the assessor had a ministerial duty to assess the entire Iatan I plant as local property subject to the school district's tax levy because the plant was not generating electricity while it was offline during the retrofit period and that she violated that duty. Missouri statutes regarding the taxation of railroads and utilities classify such property as local or distributable for purposes of taxation. State ex rel. Hatten v. Kansas City Power & Light Co., 365 Mo. 296, 281 S.W.2d 784, 786 (1955). Local property is assessed by the county and taxed on the individual levy of a school district, while distributable property is assessed by the state tax commission and taxed according to the average rates of all school districts within the county. Southwestern Bell Telephone Co. v. Bond, 595 S.W.2d 365, 367 (Mo.App.1980). For taxation of an electric company, the term distributable property is defined as all the real or tangible personal property which is used directly in the generation and distribution of electric power. § 153.034.1. The term local property, on the other hand, is defined as all real and tangible personal property ... not used directly in the generation and distribution of power. § 153.034.2. The definition of distributable property expressly excludes property held for purposes other than generation and distribution of electricity.  § 153.034.1 (emphasis added). According to the plaintiffs, the Iatan I plant was offline on January 1 (the relevant date for valuation in a given year [11] ) and, therefore, should have been assessed as local property because it was not being used to generate or distribute power at that time. However, the dispositive factor for making this determination is the purpose for which the property at issue is held, not its operational status on a particular date. It is clear that a coal-fired power plant is the type of property that is held for the purpose of generating and distributing electrical power and, therefore, would fall into the category of distributable property regardless of whether it is temporarily offline for purposes of an environmental retrofit. Accordingly, the assessor did not have a ministerial duty to assess the temporarily offline Iatan I power plant as local property.