With the memories still fresh of recent assessment fiascos, Suffolk is preparing once again to send out reassessment notices to property owners throughout the city. This time, they hope to get things right. To be sure, taxpayers share that same hope.

It’s always a bitter pill to swallow when the springtime notices arrive and one realizes that the tax liability on his property has increased. In the face of declining real estate values, a stagnant housing market, a continuing credit crunch and falling total personal wealth, such news is likely to get a welcome similar to that of a skunk arriving at a summertime picnic.

City Assessor Sid Daughtrey told the City Council on Wednesday that the news won’t be all bad this year, as the median assessment of Suffolk properties fell about 1 percent between last year and this year.

Surely there is room to argue that a 1-percent drop in assessed values is a poor reflection of current market conditions, and there are certain to be taxpayers who make that argument before the Board of Equalization in May.

But there are signs that the city plans to take steps to avoid the controversial situations that arose in recent years, when many property owners saw double-digit increases that seemed to have little connection to reality and were then forced into a drawn-out battle to have them adjusted.

With three public information sessions planned before the end of the month, Daughtrey hopes to give taxpayers the information they’ll need to judge their assessments ahead of time. And he wants them to be familiar with the dispute process before they even get their notices.

It’s a more open process this year. And while that openness may not assuage the bitterness that comes from learning that the city places a higher value on one’s home than does the market, the plan represents a move toward better local government.