[Southsider2k12]

SouthSider, you're probably one of the people who have paid thier provisional tax bills, right?
Being that it was reported that only 62 cents is being collected out of $1, compared to what is usually 93 cents tells me that people simply aren't paying thier taxes. Maybe they don't want to, maybe they simply cannot.


Nobody is buring down the entire town. IN my example, what is happening is the insurance company has agreed to fix the busted up car, they're going to pay a shade tree mechanic to piece meal the car back together with used and salvaged parts and pray that it starts back up.

What "we" want is to hold the first mechanic accountable, then get an ASE certified mechanic to fix the car properly using OEM parts so as to avoid another catastrophic failure.

And in the meantime, the entire county is screwed.

[ChickenCityRoller]

Screwed because 40% of the county hasn't paid there provisional bills, yes, you're right. I take it you and everyone here has paid that one.

[Ang]

CCR, totally off topic, but your avatar looks like his head is on backwards! There is no connotation associated with that remark, either. Just an observation on my part.

[Southsider2k12]

http://www.thenewsdispatch.com/articles/20...af230635974.txt

McDaniel’s payment comes from commission

By Alicia Ebaugh
Staff Writer
Published: Tuesday, May 25, 2010 4:13 AM CDT
LA PORTE — La Porte County Council members did not vote on making a $35,000 payment to Assessor Carol McDaniel, and instead took the money from attorney’s fees allotted to county commissioners, Council President Mark Yagelski said Monday.

The vote was originally on the agenda for the council’s Monday meeting, but Yagelski said no vote was necessary. The funds have already been transferred to her and are meant to pay a portion of her attorney fees in an Indiana Tax Court lawsuit she brought against Auditor Craig Hinchman and the Department of Local Government Finance.

Long Beach residents Bill and Dalia Wendt have petitioned the Supreme Court, challenging the Tax Court’s jurisdiction to hear McDaniel’s case. The Tax Court cannot issue a settlement if it has no jurisdiction to hear a case.

During the public comment section of the meeting, Coolspring Township Trustee Dennis Metheny asked Yagelski whether they placed the funds in escrow to await the decision of the Indiana Supreme Court.

“It’s not in escrow, it’s already been paid,” Yagelski said.

“If that case is overturned by the Supreme Court, will the county get its money back?” Metheny asked.

“That’s all the statement we have at this time,” Yagelski replied.

“I think that since this is a public comment section, I deserve an answer to my question,” Metheny said.

“This isn’t a question and answer session,” Yagelski said. “If you have a comment, make one.”

The county will not get the money back if the Supreme Court throws out McDaniel’s Tax Court case, Yagelski later confirmed. McDaniel and her Fort Wayne attorney, Mark GiaQuinta, agreed to sign a settlement in her case and another Tax Court case only if those attorney fees were paid. The settlement was approved Friday by Tax Court Judge Thomas Fisher.

“The Supreme Court has had plenty of time to stop this thing if they wanted to, but they haven’t,” Yagelski said. “We felt we had to get this thing done.”

County officials were originally going to take the money out of the reassessment fund, he said, but commissioners agreed to have it taken out of their budget with their vote on the issue. Commissioners did not return calls for comment late Monday.

[ChickenCityRoller]

THIS is absolutely ASININE! The stupidity and lack of prudence is mind boggling. Why in the world would they not simply allocate the funds and let them sit in escrow until the matter is solved? Unreal. I know for a fact they can't act like it wasn't suggested before hand. Memo's went out to every commissioner and council person suggesting that the County do just that, wait until the supreme court makes a decision.



You can bet your A$$ they'd put it in escrow (if even that) if it was their own money. It's time that these people who get elected start treating the county like a business and treat the money as if it's their own.

[Southsider2k12]

http://thenewsdispatch.com/articles/2011/0...28370658250.txt

School Board wants legislators to study La Porte County tax fiasco

By Alicia Ebaugh
Staff Writer
Published: Thursday, January 27, 2011 5:07 PM CST
MICHIGAN CITY — The Michigan City Area Schools board voted 6-1 Tuesday to ask state legislators to study La Porte County’s property tax fiasco and come up with solutions to prevent it from happening again.

Board member Beryle Burgwald, who voted against the resolution, was in favor of one that would have asked state representatives to give more power to the Department of Local Government Finance to remove or replace county auditors or assessors if there is evidence they have failed to perform their duties.

“That one at least had some teeth in it,” Burgwald said. “The second one just has gums ... You can study things to death and nothing ever gets done.”

The approved resolution, introduced by board member Dr. Vidya Kora, was a substitute for one provided to the board by La Porte City Council members. The council took action in December, asking for a change in state legislation authorizing the DLGF to remove an auditor or assessor and assign financial responsibility for the failure to appropriately assess real estate and issue tax bills. They also asked county government to be financially responsible for all interest costs on loans incurred by local units of government as a result of the county assessor or auditor’s failure to timely and appropriately assess real estate and to issue tax bills.

Burgwald’s attempt to include an amendment asking legislators to strengthen requirements necessary to become auditor or assessor failed.

“I feel like we ended up not saying anything,” he said.

Many school board members, including Kora, said they felt the time has ended for assigning “blame” for what went wrong with the county’s 2006 property assessments, which has resulted in at least five years of provisional tax bills and headaches for property owners.

“We don’t know how to tell the Legislature what to do about this,” board president Jim Kintzele said. “I think we’ve fully made them aware of our feelings. This (resolution) puts in their hands the question of what to do about it.”

Kora emphasized in his resolution that lack of cooperation among various state and county governmental agencies can cause undue delay of property tax collection, which puts the school system at risk. MCAS and other entities have been forced to borrow significant amounts of money and pay millions in interest as a result of the delay. He hoped a bipartisan committee of leaders from the state House and Senate would consider the situation and talk to county officials about what should have been handled differently.

“I’m not so much interested in ‘teeth’ as I am in understanding what went wrong, fixing it and preventing it from ever happening again,” Kora said.

[davew]

http://thenewsdispatch.com/articles/2011/0...28370658250.txt

Wow, really more studies... excellent use of tax dollars. I told Johnny the other night on WIMS in rebuttal to Friedmand claiming that the reason LaPorte Co. only got 160ish jobs out of 23k that the state got last year. Was that the Gov was Republican and LPCo is mostly Democrat. However it is his party, that is responsible for the mess. No company is going to move their plant/business here into a perceived unstable tax situation. The assessors office is the butt of many jokes downstate.

I spoke at a real estate conference last year where the Gov made a quip about a local office and mentioned no names and about 30 agents all knew it was LaPorte.