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Senate · Passed · 2025-2026 Regular Session

SB 407: Homestead Exemption; Cherokee County school district ad valorem taxes for educational purposes; provide

Last action May 12, 2026 · Effective Date

A Senate bill would give Cherokee County school district homeowners a property tax break that caps how fast their home's taxable value can rise for school taxes, through 2031, if voters approve it in a November 2026 referendum.

Read the full bill text

These buttons carry the bill's own text, not the summaries below. Copy for LLM, View as markdown, and Send to AI use the Markdown version: the text as filed, then the summaries under a heading that names them as ours. View raw is the text alone.

The summaries below were written by an AI model (claude-sonnet-5) from the text of the bill and are not part of it. Quote the text, not the summary. The stored text is the Enrolled version, the latest the General Assembly's website lists.

In plain language

Right now, homeowners in the Cherokee County school district pay school property taxes based on their home's full current assessed value. This bill would create a homestead exemption that shields part of that value from school taxes: specifically, the amount by which a home's current assessed value exceeds an adjusted 'base year' value, which can only rise by up to 4 percent a year. The base year is generally the year before someone first gets the exemption. The exemption covers the primary home and up to five acres around it, continues automatically for a surviving spouse who keeps living there, and does not apply to state, municipal, or county taxes, only Cherokee County school district taxes. The exemption would run from January 1, 2027 through the 2031 tax year. It only takes effect if Cherokee County voters approve it in a November 2026 referendum and if the General Assembly itself approved the measure by a two thirds vote. If voters reject it or the election is not held, the whole law repeals itself a year after the election date.

What the bill does

  • Creates a homestead exemption from Cherokee County school district property taxes for the amount a home's assessed value grows above an adjusted base year value.
  • Caps annual growth in the base year assessed value used for the exemption at no more than 4 percent per year.
  • Limits the exemption to a homeowner's primary residence plus up to five contiguous acres, and lets a surviving spouse keep the exemption while living there.
  • Requires homeowners to apply once with the Cherokee County tax commissioner, after which the exemption renews automatically each year.
  • Sets the exemption to run from January 1, 2027 through December 31, 2031, contingent on voter approval in a November 2026 referendum.
  • Automatically repeals the entire Act if voters reject it or if the required election is not held as specified.

Who it affects

Homeowners with a homestead inside the Cherokee County school district, the surviving spouses of those homeowners, the Cherokee County tax commissioner's office, which must process applications, and the Cherokee County election superintendent, who must run the referendum.

Why it matters

If voters approve it, eligible homeowners in the Cherokee County school district would see their school property tax bills grow more slowly for several years, since increases in taxable value above the capped base year figure would not be taxed. The measure only lasts through 2031 and needs voter approval to take effect at all.

Key provisions

  • Section 1 defines 'ad valorem taxes for educational purposes' to mean Cherokee County school district taxes, excluding bonded debt payments, and defines 'base year' with a 4 percent annual cap on assessed value growth.
  • Section 1(b) grants the exemption equal to the gap between current assessed value and the adjusted base year value, including adjustments for added improvements or removed property.
  • Section 1(c) lets a surviving spouse keep the exemption as long as they continue to live in the home.
  • Section 1(d)-(e) requires a one-time application with the Cherokee County tax commissioner, with automatic annual renewal, and requires owners to report if they become ineligible.
  • Section 1(f) clarifies the exemption applies only to Cherokee County school district taxes, not state, municipal, or county taxes.
  • Section 1(g) limits the exemption to tax years from January 1, 2027 through December 31, 2031.
  • Section 2 requires a two thirds vote in both the Senate and House for the Act to become law, per the Georgia Constitution.
  • Section 3 requires a Cherokee County referendum in November 2026, and automatically repeals the Act 365 days after the election if voters reject it or no election occurs.

From the bill

“Each resident within the Cherokee County school district is granted an exemption on that person's homestead from Cherokee County school district ad valorem taxes for educational purposes in an amount equal to the amount by which the current year assessed value of that homestead exceeds the adjusted base year assessed value”

This is the core tax break the bill creates for homeowners.

“the tax commissioner shall adjust the base year assessed value annually by no more than 4 percent”

This caps how fast the tax-exempt baseline value can grow each year.

Discussed in meetings (5)

The House and Senate meetings that took this bill up, from their machine transcripts. Each account was written by Georgia Commons with AI and is not part of the record; the video is what was said.

  1. House floor session, February 17, 2026 (legislative day 19)

    From 1:01:41 · Watch on the General Assembly's Vimeo channel · Confirmed by the 2026 House Journal, p. 622

    Summary by Georgia Commons: The clerk read a committee recommendation to pass SB 407. The House then included it in the uncontested local calendar. The chair said two homestead exemption bills on the calendar required a two-thirds vote. The calendar passed as a group, 165 to 1, without individual debate.

Status timeline

  1. 2026-05-12Effective Date
  2. 2026-05-12Act 698
  3. 2026-05-12Senate Date Signed by Governor (Senate)
  4. 2026-04-10Senate Sent to Governor (Senate)
  5. 2026-02-17House Passed/Adopted (House)
  6. 2026-02-17House Third Readers (House)
  7. 2026-02-17House Committee Favorably Reported (House)
  8. 2026-01-29House Second Readers (House)
Show full history (13 actions)
  1. 2026-01-28House First Readers (House)
  2. 2026-01-27Senate Passed/Adopted (Senate)
  3. 2026-01-27Senate Committee Favorably Reported (Senate)
  4. 2026-01-16Senate Read and Referred (Senate)
  5. 2026-01-15Senate Hopper (Senate)

Sponsors

  • Jason T. Dickerson (R, SD-21)Primary sponsor
  • John Albers (R, SD-56)
  • Kay Kirkpatrick (R, SD-32)

Votes

  1. PassedSenate voteJanuary 27, 2026

    46 yea, 0 nay (5 not voting, 3 excused)

    LOCAL CONSENT CALENDAR: Senate Vote #501

  2. PassedHouse voteFebruary 17, 2026

    165 yea, 1 nay (7 not voting, 4 excused)

    Local Calendar: House Vote #513

Topics

  • property taxes
  • homestead exemption
  • Cherokee County
  • school district taxes
  • local referendum

Ask about this bill

Answers come from this document. Not legal advice.

Machine-readable https://georgiacommons.org/bills/2025-2026/sb407.md · https://georgiacommons.org/bills/index.md · MCP https://mcp.georgiacommons.org/mcp