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The reason why breaking down the City into differem neighborhoods or zones is so important is that different neighborhoods react differently to market conditions. That one neighborhood may experience inflation at a rate different than another. For example, lots along the Rum and Mississippi Rivers were noted to be inflating al a rate of approximately 10% per year versus lots west of the landfill which were inflating at a rate of approximately 2% per year. If these two neighborhoods were lumped into the same zone and that an adjustment to correct inflation or deflation as the case may be would be unfair to one or the other. In the case of an inflating market, an adjustment would favor the river properties which would see less of a net increase ";nd would be unfair to the lower value properties which would have an adjustment greater than was actually experienced in the market. Therefore, it is essential that all properties be zoned in similar neighborhoods to achieve an accurate and fair assessment according to market value. It was originally hoped that the application of the new zones or neighborhoods in the City of Ramsey could have been done in phases or as the assessor would physically inspect the properties, and place those properties in their proper zone. This would avoid across the board adjustments which may not take into account improvements which had inaccurate physical descriptions. First, the assessor identified those neighborhoods which exhibited the greatest amount of discrepancy in improvement values. Then inspections were made of those properties to equalize the treatment of all of those improvements among the neighborhood. The remaining neighborhoods which were not inspected had a more accurate valuation of the improvements. It was hoped that these remaining neighborhoods would not experience a great degree of inflation or deflation over the year and that adjustments would not be necessary to bring these neighborhoods in line with state specified ralios. This would have allowed a gradual transition from the old neighborhoods or zones to the new. However, this was not to be the case. In November of 1989, a sales ratio was computed on the City of Ramsey which indicated an overall sales ratio of 91.6% with a coefficient of dispersion of 9. The required median ratio for the County and State were to be at the median ratio of 95% and an acceptable coefficient of dispersion from the median would be: Greater than 10 would be unacceptable, between 8 and 10 would be fair, between 5 and 8 would be good, and less than 5 would be excellent. Therefore, it was determined that adjustments would be required in the 1990 assessment as the existing sales ratio study was exceeding the standards. In order to achieve that objective in a fair and equitable manner would require a rezoning or redesigning the neighborhood structure for assessment purposes across the City of Ramsey. This was done by using the neighborhood analysis described earlier and applying it to all the properties in the City of Ramsey by manually going through all of the assessment cards and manually placing them in their respective zone or neighborhood. Once that was accomplished, then it was a matter of making the adjustment for each neighborhood to bring the sales ratio for each neighborhood up to County and State requirements. 4