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SCHENECTADY
Homeowners successful in grievance process
Appraisers help residents fight city on assessments
BY KATHLEEN MOORE Gazette Reporter
Reach Gazette reporter Kathleen Moore at 395-3120 or moore@dailygazette.com.

    After a year-long learning curve, residents are beginning to win against the city in assessment grievances.
    Just over a third of the owners who took their cases to small claims court this year have won, according to law department records.
    Some residents whose cases were thrown out last year on technical grounds learned their lesson. Instead of trying to fight the city alone, they hired appraisers this year to represent them in small claims court. They saw that strategy bear fruit.
    The city sent an attorney to every case to fight on technical grounds. Last year, that worked well — the attorney was able to get many cases thrown out. But the appraisers who handled many of this year’s cases were far less likely to make paperwork mistakes.
    Of the 109 small claims cases this year, 31 were won by the property owner. The city won or settled in 53 cases; the rest have not yet been decided.
    Neil Turck, whose case was thrown out a year ago because he neglected to serve one city offi cial, was one of the big winners.
    He finally got his day in court this month, and the judge cut his assessment in half, bringing it down to $80,000.
    Turck’s assessment had been $56,000 before last year’s city-wide reassessment. Under reassessment, his Bellevue house jumped to $182,000.
    He insisted that his house couldn’t be sold for more than $70,000. When he found a note on his door from the city’s data collectors, asking him to call to make an appointment to have his property checked, he called at once.
    He never got an appointment (city officials said they got too many calls to schedule appointments for everyone), lost on Grievance Day last year and didn’t even get to make his case in court.
    He took his complaint to the Board of Assessment Review on Grievance Day again this year, and won a slight reduction — his house went from $182,000 to $150,000.
    That was still way too much.
    “I truly believe the city thought, ‘Well, we’ll reduce it to 150 and he’ll feel happy,’ ” Turck said.
    He fi led — again — for a small claims hearings, this time with the help of an appraiser.
    Six days before his court date, the assessment office called to schedule the data collection appointment he’d tried to get a year ago. .......................>>>>.........................>>>>..................http://www.dailygazette.net/De.....r01000&AppName=1

The city is so desperate for money to fund their ridiculous programs and build things that taxpayers don't want that they are willing to knowingly appraised property values above what is fair value and then have the nerve to fight taxpayers in court and get cases thrown out on technicalities. The city knew that the appraisals were way over fair market value when they did the re-val IMHO. There should be a new re-val done by an independent appraiser who is not affiliated with the city.

This is why the soleless Assessor should have been canned last year. Ditto for the horrible "leader" of the appeals board Lady Madonna. These antiques need to be cleaned out. Added almost a billion to City assessed values completed at the top of the housing bubble, to squeeze every nickle out of the City sheeple.

     Later you find out why so some golf pro can grab a salary of $314,000. Back up the Brinks truck to the golf course. And nobody at the City Council, Finance Dept nor Mayor's office knew about it? lol. According to the Gazetto he is doing an "excellent job"! Of what? Only with the DEM idiots in Schenectady is this allowed. It's encouraged and no one will say a discouraging word. As a vital part of the "working together" crew we have the highest paid golf pro is the Nation! Renaissance! Rebirth! Another Savage miracle!