(WSBT) St. Joseph County says taxpayers won't be receiving two property tax bills this year, just one. That bill will likely be an expensive one. Property tax reassessments went up, on average, 25 percent statewide.

The fall tax bill is supposed to be due in November, but property owners in St. Joseph County still haven't gotten the first bill that was supposed to be mailed and sent back in May.

“Yeah, we don't have the rates yet. So we're not sure what the taxes will be this year,” a worker in the treasurer’s office told one concerned caller.

St. Joseph County is one of 23 counties that can't calculate tax bills because the still state hasn't set the tax rate.

Tax bills didn't come in the spring because counties were still figuring reassessments.

Now approaching the fall tax bill deadline, Treasurer Sean Coleman says this year the two-payment property tax will have to be combined into one.

"There's just too much delay and uncertainty and too much to do with not enough time to do it," Coleman said.

The county says it simply wouldn't have time to process two bills within weeks of each other.

But it's salt in an open wound for some homeowners, already upset with skyrocketing reassessments. They’ll now be forced to pay all at once.

"I think somebody should be hurt for that,” one frustrated taxpayer told WSBT.

“They're going to have to be borrowing if they don't have anything in reserve, and nowadays most people don't have money in reserve," taxpayer Nancy Beeman said.

Coleman says taxpayers can start making voluntary payments now to cushion the blow. He hopes next year, the mailman can once again deliver two bills.

"This should be the most difficult year; at least that's my hope,” he said.

So far, the county says it's gotten about $20 million in voluntary payments.