1992 04 20 BORCN,~iI~,BEIEN BO~LRD OF EQU~LLTZ&TZON
]tND REV'fEW
XPR'rL 20· 1992
Mayor Chmiel called the meeting to order at 7:10 p.m.. The meeting
was opened with the Pledge to the Flag.
MEMBERS PRESENT~ Mayor Chmiel, Councilman Mason, Councilman
Workman, Councilman Wing and Councilwoman Dimler
STAFF PRESENT~ Don Ashworth, City Manager and Todd Gerhardt, Asst.
City Manager
COUNT~ ~SESSOR'5 5TAFF~ Orlin Schafer, Steve Just and Ann Wyse
Mayor Chmiel: This evening for our Board of Equalization and
Review, we're going to go through a process of taking people as
they have signed in for one. What I'd like to try to do, so we can
leave here hopefully by midnight or 1:00 or so, is to allow at
least a minimum of 5 minutes. The Council this evening will not
respond to your respective statements. These statements will be
taken and taken by our Assessor from the County. He will then
review your request and possibly come up with a conclusion of being
in favor or leaving where the particular tax portion is at with the
valuation of your property. After that, we will go through the
process of hearing and listening to each one and then move from
there. Persons that are not wishing to speak and maybe have signed
up, hopefully they have filled the forms that were on the outside
which gives you the right to come back at the May 11th meeting that
we will here again. And at that time determinations will be made
as to where the total valuation is on your property. So with that
I would like to maybe, Orlin, do you have something to say prior to
taking?
Orlin Schafer: Probably just this Mayor is that everyone that
signed up and is going to address the Council, this is taped and it
is also transcribed for us so we do understand what you're saying.
We do have the ability to go back and check the tape if we're a
little confused at what you said. Those people who have written
letters to us and those people who have filled out the forms and
have made their appeal known in writing, we will address all of
these issues. We'll contact you by phone if you've-given us a
phone number. If you haven't, please do so or call our office and
remind us or give it to us there if you haven't put it on the form.
But do make yourself available for it. Again this is a meeting
concerning the 1992 assessment for taxes payable in 1993. We're
really not here to take the time of your neighbors and your Council
to talk about what happened in 1991 for taxes payable in 1992.
That appeal was last year. Same place, almost the same time. If
you missed it last year, your recourse right now would be to file
in tax court. These people cannot address any issue that should
have come up in 1991. So if you feel offended by that, I apologize
for it but that's a State law. These meetings are run according to
the Statutes and the State law prevents this Board from acting on
anything that would affect any other year's assessment. So we're
dealing only with 1992's assessment. The value that was on your
card for payable in 1993. And please do not belabor the tax issue
if you can at all help it. If you're really incensed about it,
perhaps contact my office or we might advise you to file with tax
Board of Review and Equalization Minutes
April 20, 1992
-2-
court. I mean that might be your only avenue of appeal to open the
door. It's not something that we treat lightly. We do respect
your wishes and we try to work very well with the general public.
Overall, maybe for the Council's information, the assessment level
this year started out prior to our assessment we ran some numbers
in early summer and it looked like our assessment was going to be
somewhere around 86%, which means 86% of the market value. We
zeroed in on that and isolated some areas and Scott Winter was
still with us at that point and he begun to view property last fall
in those areas we knew we were really going to have a problem with.
Ironically he moved on to another district out of our county in
January so Steve Just and Ann Wyse took over instead and have
continued to work with it. Right now our ratio charged against the
last sales study has risen to 94%. We're charged by law to be at
market value. Now they didn't say a percentage of market value.
They said market value and it's been that way for years. If you
looked at your card and you feel that we're somewhere close to what
you would expect to get for your house, then we're doing our Job.
It's as simple as that. If you paid more for your house in the
last year or 18 months than what we have your house valued at, look
for very little if any relief unless there's major problems with
your house and you overpaid. Then we would adjust. We're
reasonable. We understand these things. There are some procedures
you can't do. Again, on an individual basis we might have to
discuss them with you privately. Again the sales have indicated
that Chanhassen as a result of the 1992 assessment should be
somewhere around the 93% to 94% percentile. We hope that's true
because the State Commissioner of Revenue does audit our books and
if we're not somewhere near close to that, we could get a State
increase. We haven't for the last several years. We've been able
to head that off and have been doing a fairly good Job. I think
that's probably it unless the Council has any questions for me at
this point.
Mayor Chmiel then opened discussion from the audience. The
following people spoke regarding concerns they have about their
property valuations. The specific comments from each property
owner are contained in File A-31 at City Hall. Persons interested
may review these comments during regular business hours.
Councilman Mason moved, Councilman Workman seconded to continue the
hearing by the Board of Equalization and Review until May 11, 1992.
All voted in favor and the motion carried. The meeting was
adjourned at 9:35 p.m.
Submitted by Don Ashworth
City Manager
Prepared by Nann Opheim