AGY-987 | Valuer General's Department

Full description

The Valuation of Land Act, 1916 (Act No. 2 1916) (1) provided for the appointment of a Valuer-General and for the establishment of the Department of Valuer-General to bring uniformity to valuation activity. The Valuer General evaluates land in all parts of New South Wales for levying rates, taxes of duties on the value of land. The Valuer-General was also made responsible for valuations for the purposes of resumption, or to determine security for mortgages advanced by the Crown. Property valuation services and advice are provided to government, departments and authorities, and the community.

The foundation staff of the Valuer-General’s Department was drawn from the Land Valuation Branch of the Public Works Department and the State Land Tax Office. During its first year of operation the Department valued the municipality of Manly and issued the first Valuation List, which came into force for rating purposes on 1 January 1918. (2)

The early development of the Department was slow with the 'Great Depression' and onset of World War Two. The events of the war caused a fluctuation in land values and the National Security (Economic) Regulations were used to control property prices. It was not until the post war boom that the Department expanded rapidly. From the first valuation list compiled in 1917 the total number of valuations recorded had grown to 1,536,000 at 30 June 1968 and the number of districts covered had risen to 189. (3)

During this period the Valuer-General’s Department provided a number of miscellaneous services including -
· valuations for the guidance of the Fair Rents Board;
· special valuations for the Land Tax Commissioner;
· valuation books for drainage trusts;
· recommendations to councils in terms of section 160c of the Local Government Act 1919;
· the supply of maps, plans and technical descriptions connected to acquisitions and resumptions by other departments.

In 1970s and early 1980s government departments began to develop their own "valuing cells" of officers selected from the Valuer General’s Department. (4) The loss of trained personnel from the Valuer-General’s Department and the higher cost to community of not using the Department’s regional offices became a constant concern to the Department.

The real estate valuations by the Valuer-General’s Department covered -
· residential property
· retail property
· office property
· industrial property
· rural home sites
· hobby farms (farmlets)
· grazing land
· cereal growing areas
· specialist crop lands for cotton and rice
· tourism areas.

In the late 1990s the NSW Valuer-General's Department's computer records contain details of over two million properties throughout New South Wales. As a regulatory body the Valuer-General's Department now supervises open tendering processes for contracts for mass valuation services in the Sydney, Newcastle and Wollongong metropolitan areas for which both private valuers and the State Valuation Office can compete. The Department provides valuations of land throughout the State to local councils, the Office of State Revenue and Water Boards for rating and taxing purposes. Where land is compulsorily acquired for public purposes, the Department determines under the Land Acquisition (Just Terms Compensation) Act 1991 (Act No.22 1991) (5), the amount of compensation to be offered to the dispossessed owner. The public may obtain extracts from the Valuation Roll showing the ownership and land value of a property.

The State Valuation Office was removed from the Valuer General's Department on 8 April 1999 and added to the Department of Public Works and Services. (6) The Valuer General's Department was abolished by proclamation also on 8 April 1999 and the responsibilities of the Department were added to the Department of Information Technology and Management. (7)

It appears that the entity continued to operate as the Valuer General's Office until 1 July 2000 when it joined with the Surveyor General's Department, the Land Titles Office and the Land Infomation Centre to become the Government Business Enterprise - Land and Property Information, New South Wales. (8)

Endnotes
1. Assented to 17 March 1916, NSW Government Gazette No.54, 24 March 1916 p.1756.
2. ‘Know your Departments: The Valuer General’s Department’, Progress, Vol. 7, No. 4, December 1968, p.30.
3. Ibid., p.30.
4. Valuer-General of New South Wales Annual Report for the year ended 30 June 1980, p.8.
5. Assented to 30 August 1991, NSW Government Gazette No.125, 6 September 1991, p.7742.
6. NSW Government Gazette No.42, 8 April 1999, p.2688.
7. Ibid.
8. Public Service Notices, 21 June 2000 p.22.