CARMEL – The company that is developing the town’s revaluation is asking for an extension, but with so much depending on the assessment, town officials want it sooner rather than later.

“I think we should maybe put our foot down and ask them to honor their time” frame, Selectman John Luce said at Monday’s selectmen’s meeting.

The board was given a Sept. 21 letter from Robert Duplisea of Pittsfield-based RJD Appraisal who was asking to move the implementation date of the revaluation from 2006 to 2007. In the letter, Duplisea cited a full workload and the loss of one of six employees as the reason for the request.

“At this point in time, it looks like RJD cannot commit to a 2006 revaluation,” Duplisea wrote in the letter. “This letter is not easy for me to write but please understand I have no choice.”

The revaluation was to be done in four parts, with property in one-quarter of the town to be reviewed each year. The fourth year in the sequence was to be this year, although the assessment for this year has yet to be done. Next year was to be the year that the information was compiled and the revaluation completed.

Town officials said that the revaluation is an important step forward and that town property values now are based on an assessment that is more than 10 years old. A new revaluation likely would lower the town’s mill rate, and the revaluation numbers are used in computing county taxes and are looked at when the state computes its own valuations in developing its school funding.

Carmel residents taking advantage of the homestead exemptions are doing so now at 80 percent of what they could be receiving and with a revaluation they would be eligible for 100 percent, town officials said.

Selectman Doug Small said he felt that the company was pushing back the town’s date to allow it to absorb the new business that they have.

“We shouldn’t have to pay for the way that they run a business,” Smith said.

The selectmen asked to have a company representative attend the next meeting on Oct. 3 to discuss the matter with them.