Sunday, June 6, 2010

“‘Levy tax later, hold municipal polls first’” plus 2 more

“‘Levy tax later, hold municipal polls first’” plus 2 more

‘Levy tax later, hold municipal polls first’

Posted: 06 Jun 2010 12:46 PM PDT

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All property owners, who fall under the jurisdiction of Municipal Corporation of Gurgaon (MCG) and have received house tax assessment notices, have decided not to pay property tax. Their reason: They want the Haryana Government to announce elections for a proper municipal body with a mayor and municipal councillors in place.

Various resident welfare bodies, traders' and industrial associations, along with residents from villages, met on Saturday to oppose the house tax assessment notices. At the meeting, organised by the Joint Action Forum of RWAs (Jafra) in Gurgaon, it was decided that there would be full-scale protests held — public rallies, road blockages and hunger strikes — if these notices were not withdrawn.

Jafra Chairman Col. (Retd.) Ratan Singh said that the MCG, which does not have an elected body of people's representatives and has not held even one election since its formation in 2008, has "slapped house tax on lakhs of house owners". He said: "According to the provisions of Haryana Municipal Act 1994, house owners have a right to file objection with the MCG committee, comprising of its commissioner and two elected representatives of the community. But the latter do not exist as there were no municipal elections."

According to him, the MCG has no right to ask for house tax, until it has a body of elected municipal councillors in place. Singh said that a delegation from Jafra would soon meet Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and request him to withdraw the tax notices. "If the CM refuses to meet our demand, we would be left with no other option but to take to streets and start agitation," he said.

Madan Yadav, president of DLF Qutub Enclave RWA, said the DLF City residents were already paying maintenance charges to DLF for the house maintenance and the demand for house tax by the MCG was unjustified, as it would an added burden on the residents.

Panchayat representatives, of the 42 villages that were merged with the MCG in 2008, also participated. They said the MCG had already transferred Rs. 350 crore from the panchayats' accounts, thus there was no question of villagers paying house tax to MCG.  

The MCG officials, however, clarified that the house tax had nothing to do with the maintenance of the townships or municipal elections. Therefore, the people should pay house tax as many have already done.

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County faces backlog of property tax appeals

Posted: 05 Jun 2010 11:49 PM PDT

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Thurston County: Some owners wait 16 months, have multiple appeals

CHRISTIAN HILL; Staff writer | • Published June 06, 2010

Hundreds of taxpayers have been forced to wait at least 16 months for their property tax appeals to be heard because of a significant increase in the number of challenges and inadequate staffing to handle them.

The Thurston County Board of Equalization, which hears and decides these appeals, has begun to chip away at the backlog since the county commission approved additional funding and staff time. The commission's action came after complaints by property owners prompted state officials to express their own concern late last summer.

But the additional resources will run out at year's end, and the board expects to have cleared only appeals from the 2008 assessment year by then.

The board then will start hearing 2009 appeals. Longtime board member Bruce Reeves said the board would request additional help from county commissioners, if needed. It's unclear what commitment they can make in that event, however.

Sandra Romero, chairwoman of the county commission, said she recognizes the potential need but noted that the county faces the prospect of difficult decisions for the 2011 budget.

"I'm very hesitant right now to make any promises until I see the big picture," said Romero, who has also heard complaints about the backlog.

In the meantime, changes have been made to quicken the pace, including altering the hearing format and digitally scanning records.

Other counties have large backlogs – none bigger than Thurston County's – but have kept them under control with staffing and resources, said Mike Gowrylow, chief spokesman for the state Department of Revenue, which trains the board members, oversees the appeals process and received the local complaints.

"Thurston County is somewhat unique in that sense," he said.

The lag time introduces more uncertainty to a process that is complex and sometimes intimidating for property owners who have the burden to prove why their valuation should be changed.

"It's frustrating," said Rodney Woodin, who lives on 12 acres south of Rochester and waited more than a year for a hearing after he appealed his 2007 and 2008 assessments. "If we want services, we have to pay more taxes. It's a Catch-22."

Another Rochester-area property owner, Tom Irwin, said he gave up on his appeal and had forgotten until a hearing notice arrived in early May – 16 months after he filed his challenge.

"We don't like to see that there's a delay," Reeves said, "and people don't understand why we're not looking at current assessment levels instead of 2007 and 2008 (levels)."

Each October, the assessor's office mails change-of-value notices to property owners. Property valuations determined by the assessor's office are a basis for calculating how much tax an owner should pay the following year.

State law requires the assessor's office to visually inspect a property once every six years to determine its value. It uses a statistical update that includes market sales data to determine valuations for properties not being inspected in a given year. The valuation is as of Jan. 1 of the assessment year.

Property owners have 30 days from the time they receive the notices to appeal to the county Board of Equalization, an independent volunteer body. The three board members and their three alternates are paid a per diem fee for attending hearings.

Deciding property tax appeals has never been a speedy process. The property owner must file all the necessary paperwork. The assessor's office must review it and defend its assessment. The board must schedule a hearing to consider testimony before making a decision.

"We've never been caught up," said Ruth Elder, the board's clerk, adding that the typical delay in the past has been several months.

The delay has lengthened significantly as the number of appeals has exploded in recent years. In 2006, 783 appeals were filed, according to data provided by the board. The number more than doubled during the two subsequent years, to 1,927 in 2007 and 1,986 in 2008. Elder predicts that up to 1,200 appeals were filed for last year's assessment, although the exact number isn't known because they're still being processed.

Not all the appeals result in a hearing; appeals can be withdrawn or settled, and an owner with several parcels can challenge multiple assessments at one hearing. The board heard 988 appeals from the 2007 assessment year, nearly quadruple the number it considered for the previous year, the data show. Of those, the board sustained 515 valuations, lowered 470 and increased three.

Kitsap County, which has a similar population and number of tax parcels, had in its last three assessment years 614, 524 and 401 appeals, respectively. Rhiannon Fernandez, the clerk of that county's Board of Equalization, said it should clear its 2009 assessment year appeals in a few months.

In February, the Thurston County board began hearing appeals filed in October 2008, a lag of at least 16 months.

The dramatic spike in appeals here can be attributed to the volatile housing market. In 2007, market activity at the height of the housing boom caused property value increases that surprised many residents, resulting in a large number of challenges, county officials said. The following year, with the housing market and economy in free-fall, the appeals were driven by property owners expecting a decline in value.

Reeves also cited the tremendous growth in the community – Thurston County's population has increased 20 percent in the past decade, compared with a 6 percent population increase in Kitsap County – and what he called a "pretty live-wire community."

"I mean a lot of the people in the county are state workers and educated workers," he said. "You know, they are sensitive to policies and taxes, and they are up on things."

Board member Elizabeth Lyman agreed, saying a lot of residents have experience with government and "are not intimidated by the process."

Assessor Patricia Costello rejects the notion that there is a systemic problem with her office's valuations. She noted that the number of appeals is not out of the ordinary, representing about 1 percent of the property revaluations mailed annually.

"I'm really confident with our process and our ratio and the uniformity throughout the county," she said.

Regardless of the origins of this spike, Thurston County hasn't provided enough staffing to keep the resulting backlog in check and minimize delays.

Past county commissions have provided some additional staff time, but it wasn't enough in the face of the deluge of appeals filed in recent years.

For several years, Elder was the only employee working to support the board. Another employee was brought in to help, working with the board for up to 32 hours a week before she left in February 2009, during the height of the county's budget crisis. She was replaced by two other employees who worked a total of 12 hours a week to assist Elder and the board.

After the inquiry by the state Revenue Department, the board redoubled its efforts. It changed its meeting format from scheduling appointments for individual hearings, which resulted in numerous no-shows, to inviting a group of property owners to a hearing and calling them up based on when they check in. It also scheduled as many extra hearings as its budget allowed during the latter part of 2009 and the early part of this year.

Earlier this year, county commissioners authorized $25,000 in funding for a full-time employee, who started recently, to help reduce the backlog. The new person will replace the two employees. The county also provided $26,000 for hearing per diems and supplies; otherwise, the budget for conducting hearings would have been depleted by the end of June.

Board members said they appreciate the county commissioners' assistance, and the extra funding and process changes have begun to make a difference.

The board and county continue to examine long-term solutions to keep the backlog at bay. For instance, documents submitted to the board have begun being digitally scanned to spare the time and expense of copying them for distribution.

"The county commissioners and Board of Equalization are making a sincere attempt to get this back under control and, at the rate it's going, it will be done," Costello said. "And then it's up to us to work together to make it continue."

Christian Hill: 360-754-5427 chill@theolympian.com www.theolympian.com/outsideoly

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Spring Hill considers property tax increase

Posted: 06 Jun 2010 11:24 AM PDT

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Spring Hill leaders are still struggling with a request to increase the property tax rate by almost one-half.

Mayor Michael Dinwiddie's budget recommends adding 28 cents to the current rate, 60 cents per $100 of assessed value. Alderman Keith Hudson asked City Administrator Victor Lay to outline what would happen with a 12-cent increase and asked him to include a 3 percent raise for city employees, who went without a raise last year.

The tax rate has been 60 cents since the board reinstated the city tax in 2008 after three years of going without one.

Lay later said a 12-cent increase would probably be enough to balance the budget without having to lay off city employees, but it would not be enough to give them a raise, and it would not be enough to rebuild the city's depleted reserves.

It would allocate $787,700 to new equipment in the capital improvement plan, which has gone unfunded for the past two years.

Lay said the board is still trying to make line-item changes that could make an employee pay raise possible.

— JILL CECIL WIERSMA
THE TENNESSEAN

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