I resigned as Pima County assessor in 1980, but my successors - Paul Sullivan, Arnold Jeffers, Rex Waite, Alan Lang, Rick Lyons and Bill Staples - have kept on sending out those pesky annual notices of full cash value.

This is the first spring in 40 years that most homeowners’ valuations have been less than they were the year before.

So why will virtually all of us get our highest tax bill in history this fall?

It’s because 2008 tax bills will be based on the values we received a year ago, in March 2007.

The value notices that just came out will affect our 2009 tax bills, 18 months from now. And we’ll probably pay even more then.

Take a look at the notice you just received from the assessor and find the line labeled "Limited Value."

When the assessor’s office determines a property’s full cash value has increased by more than 10 percent in a year, state law limits the increase to no more than 10 percent. The goal is to defer the annual impact of big valuation increases on your tax bill.

But there are hitches. That limited value applies only to primary property taxes you pay for the regular maintenance and operation of counties, school districts, cities and towns, and community college districts.

Taxes approved by voters for bonds, budget overrides or new taxing districts are not limited. Neither are taxes for special districts that provide fire protection, water, libraries, flood control and some other services. No matter how much your full cash value goes up, your assessed value for those items rises by the same amount.

Let’s take a home inside the Tucson city limits and Tucson Unified School District that had a full cash value of $190,000 for 2005. The value rose to $221,000 for 2006, then to $276,000 for 2007 and to $310,000 for its 2008 tax bill that will come this fall.

That’s an increase of 63 percent in full cash value from 2005 through 2008. But its limited value only went up to $246,500, not $310,000.

That saved the owners some money on primary taxes, but not on those secondary taxes for special districts, overrides and bonds.

And no matter what happens in the real estate market, their limited value will continue rising annually until it again equals the full cash value.

So while our example’s full cash value on this year’s notice dropped slightly, from $310,000 to $306,000 for 2009, the limited value rose from $246,500 to $271,000.

Unless all taxing jurisdictions cut their rates substantially next year, these homeowners will pay even more taxes in the fall of 2009 than this year, setting another record.

This smoke-and-mirrors system where "higher values mean higher taxes, but lower values also mean higher taxes" explains why Proposition 13 Arizona and Arizona Tax Revolt are passing initiative petitions to put three measures on the November ballot to limit valuations and tax levies.

Both groups’ plans would provide some tax relief to homeowners.

But they also would aggravate budget problems for the state, counties, school districts, cities and towns, community colleges and every other taxing jurisdiction. The impact would be especially ugly for school and community college districts.

For several years, state Rep. David Bradley, D-Tucson, has been crying in the wilderness for the Legislature to overhaul state property tax laws. If he has any supporters, they’ve been mute.

As a result, Arizona is a cinch to retain one of its few No. 1 rankings among the 50 states. We’re tops in the complexity and incomprehensibility of our valuation and taxation system.

All of us, from home and business owners to state and local governments and also from schools to colleges, could be on the verge of paying a terrible price.

Sadly, we could have avoided this crisis. Democratic Gov. Bruce Babbitt and legislative leaders from both parties did it in 1979-80, when they defeated an earlier Proposition 13 initiative effort by completely revising Arizona’s system.

Apparently David Bradley is the only state official who wants to do that today.

Contact Steve Emerine or e-mail comments for publication to editor@azbiz.com. Emerine, a Tucson resident since 1960, has run Steve Emerine Strategic Public Relations since 1994. He is a former local newspaper reporter, editor and columnist and served as Pima County Assessor from 1973 to 1980. He is a regular Monday guest on the John C. Scott radio talk show, which airs from 6 a.m. to 7 a.m. weekdays on The Voice KVOI 690-AM. This column appears weekly in Inside Tucson Business.