After residents departed the Norway Select Board‘s business meeting Oct. 1 with no answers on what their tax bills will look like this year, Town Manager Jill Lathan announced Friday that contracted tax assessor John O’Donnell had committed the property taxes and set the tax rate at $10.85.

In an 8 a.m. email statement, Lathan wrote that the property taxes had been committed at at rate of $10.85 per $1,000 of assessed value.

She later clarified that “the tax commitment was officially filed October 1st to the State (of Maine). It was confirmed this morning.”

Dozens of residents have spoken out at recent Select Board meetings about issues they say resulted in revaluations recently done by O’Donnell’s appraisal firm, John E. O’Donnell & Associates containing errors and oversights.

It’s the first revaluation the town has done in 19 years..

To a person, each urged the board to rescind or delay the revaluations, or at least alter the process, to give taxpayers leeway to properly refute their updated tax cards.

Several alleged that O’Donnell’s company’s staff cut corners during the reevaluation, misrepresenting building uses, failing to measure structures and incorrectly assigning condition grades and comparative properties to determine values, among other issues.

It has also been asserted that O’Donnell has a conflict of interest, with property owners now in a position of having to challenge a private business owner who also has the power as a sworn town official to acknowledge or deny their disputes with its services.

About 1,000 Norway property owners will see a tax decreases as a result of the revaluation. But values and tax payments are increasing for more than 3,400, many significantly.

Last month Matthew Glatz, a resident of King Street who said his multiunit home value soared by 200%, created a website — A Citizen’s Guide for Fair and Transparent Property Tax Valuations, norwayparcelreview.org — which calculates how property values for every parcel in Norway changed from 2025 to 2026.

Last year, his home’s assessed value was $115,923 and his taxes were $2,363, based on a tax rate of $20.38.

Now it is valued at $349,015, and using a hypothetical tax rate of $10.96 the website calculates that this year his tax bill would be $3,825. Applying the $10.85 rate Lathan announced Oct. 2, his actual taxes will be $3,787.

On Oct. 1, as an example of one problem with his revaluation, Glatz pointed out to the board how the foundation of his house had been miscategorized. “At 15 King St., it has a sand basement floor,” he said. “The basement is only 16 by 16 feet. More than half my basement is crawlspace … The building grade does not increase when a re-evaluation occurs. You cannot change the structure or skeleton of a building.

No property owner has disputed the need for a revaluation in Norway.

But town spending has jumped by 50% over the last four years, a period overseen by three short-term, acting or interim town managers.

This year’s municipal budget was 11% higher than for the 2025 fiscal year.

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