VALDOSTA, Ga. (WALB) - After a recent Georgia Supreme Court ruling, affordable housing developers were optimistic that fairer tax assessments would allow their projects to move forward with less legal headache.

The state Supreme Court ruled that tax assessors must value affordable housing using the income approach — meaning that they are taxed on the rent they collect, not necessarily on the market value of the unit.

That decision ended a decade-long dispute in Lowndes County.

Developers like IDP Properties said the long fight over grueling tax evaluations forced multiple appeals before reaching the state’s highest court.

“Now you’re not just impacting the business owners,” President of IDP Properties Rhett Holmes said. “You’re impacting the residents who have to live at the properties

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