From the Jeffersonville News and Tribune:
A court order has allowed residential real estate developer Robert Lynn Co. Inc. off the hook for thousands in fees that it would have owed to Clark County after falling behind on tax bills.
Treasurer David Reinhardt said he believes the developer is getting special treatment and said the move cost the county. He said it was frustrating that one taxpayer got that kind of relief when no one else did.
“I had a lot of taxpayers complain about it and I said, ‘it’s the law,’” Reinhardt said.
Judge Dan Moore granted Robert Lynn Co. relief on about $22,000 in tax sale fees.
When a landowner doesn’t pay their taxes for three billing cycles, or about a year and a half, the delinquent property is sent to a tax sale so the county can collect what it’s owed. A $110 tax sale fee is assessed to cover the cost of inventorying land, advertising and to pay the contractor — in this case SRI Inc. — to handle the sale.
The land in question was vacant and developers are given a discount on taxes under Indiana law. Robert Lynn Co. attorney Alan Applegate explained that because of the developer discount, the company only owed $2,200 in taxes but had to pay tax sale fees of $22,000.
Based on that discrepancy, Applegate argued in a filing dated Sept. 28, 2011 — days before the tax sale — that “requiring the payment of the tax sale fee prior to the sale of the delinquent properties at public sale is unconscionable and constitutes a penalty against [the company] with no corresponding benefit to Clark County.”
Moore ruled in favor of the company, saying in an order that same day that “requiring the petitioner to pay the $110 tax sale fee for each of the properties would be unfair, unjust and unduly burdensome.”
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Reinhardt filed a motion to reconsider, but that was dismissed by the court last month. The treasurer was given an opportunity to testify on the matter at a hearing on that motion.
In the end, Robert Lynn Co. paid the taxes, sans the fee, and the land never went to the tax sale.
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He noted there were other delinquent properties owned by the company for which the fee wasn’t waived. The tax sale vendor, SRI, is paid $70 for each parcel only if the tax sale fee is collected. Because it wasn’t in this case, the county did not have to pay SRI for any work it did on the Lynn land.
Regardless, Reinhardt said, the matter still cost his staff in man hours and the legal advertisement space.
Reinhardt points out that Robert Lynn Co. was the only taxpayer to have the fee waived this time. However, Lockard — who has represented the county on the tax sale for several years — said it’s not the first time it has ever happened.
“These aren’t the first fees to get waived,” Lockard said. “The judge has discretion in awarding those fees or not. The important part was the county collected the taxes.”
http://newsandtribune.com/business/x1968173492/Developer-gets-break-on-tax-sale-fees-from-Clark-County
