| Author | Message | ||
     Citizen |
(The following letter was hand-delivered this evening to the Mayor and each member of the Township Committee) Maplewood Fair Taxation Committee January 30, 2001 TO: Mayor Vic DeLuca (hand deliver) Maplewood Township Committee Members (hand deliver) CC: News Record (via fax) * * * There has been speculation and misinformation over the Maplewood Fair Taxation Committee and what its members collectively stand for as a group. We are a group of concerned Maplewood citizens who want a revaluation that is fair and accurate for all. We are not affiliated with any political party, nor are we against paying taxes. We are for fairness and for everyone paying a fair share. Each day, many residents are reaching out to us, looking for general information and clarification on how to appeal their assessments. Others ask us if we're going forward with a lawsuit against the Township Committee (TC) and want to know how they can help and participate. Many others send us e-mails at fairtax01@aol.com to express their support or to simply feel linked to the process. All of these people are searching for a way to make a difference in the face of a Township Committee that is divided and unsure of how to resolve this issue. What has become clear in the past week is that the TC is retreating from its original position of defending the revaluation. The TC has conceded publicly that the revaluation is flawed. The adjustment letters recently sent to residents further support this. Additionally, the TC is moving forward with hiring a third-party assessor to review the revaluation. These are encouraging developments. However, we are not convinced they will guarantee fairness. There is a disturbing theme coming from the TC that the responsibility to fix the revaluation rests with the residents on an individual basis. Shifting this burden to the residents is not a solution, it is an easy way out for the TC. The residents of Maplewood have done more than their fair share to fix their own flawed revaluations. They have had to fight with an uncooperative and insensitive Tax Assessors office and track down an elusive and aloof vendor in Certified Valuations. The TC seems satisfied with making the residents guess how the revaluation was done. None of us knows what our homes are worth now because of this process. As taxpayers, we paid Certified to tell us that, and we didn't get what we paid for. We received revaluations that were incorrect and arbitrary. Entire neighborhoods have had their assessments changed. Where are the comparables? What are the adjustments? No one knows or can effectively explain them. Now, we are told that if we have any further questions, we must send a letter explaining the "error" with "supporting documentation." In addition, the TC has not explained why the tax burden is being shifted from commercial properties along Springfield Avenue to residents. Enough is enough. We are prepared to help push the TC toward resolving this issue. Here is our position: - We are formally requesting a 30-minute meeting with Mayor DeLuca in the next week to engage him in a dialogue on resolving the revaluation issue; - We respectfully request that a small group of Maplewood residents be allowed to participate in the actual review work of the third-party assessor; - We respectfully request that the TC postpone this year's revaluation until a fair remedy is developed. Many residents have told us in the past few days that we're not doing enough as a group to engage the TC to resolve this issue. In some respects they're right. We've tried to give the TC the benefit of the doubt, but it's becoming clear the TC is concerned more about political survival than doing the right thing. We are ready to move this forward to resolution. Is the Township Committee? Meet with us Mayor DeLuca, and show us you agree the issue is one of fairness. Respectfully submitted: Maplewood Fair Taxation Committee | ||
| Townie |
I for one am firmly opposed to what "Fair Tax" is trying to do and I urge the Mayor and the entire township committee to ignore them. They DO NOT represent Maplewood's citizens. They were not elected to do anything and I for one certainly don't want them sitting on any boards reviewing anything. Statements like "none of us know what our homes are worth" reflect the thoughts of whom? The rest of us aren't in their fix. They speak for no one but themeselves and have a privately concocted agenda. As other posts in other threads on this board will tell you, the controversy over the reval is fading away as people taking a closer look at the numbers and see that their assessment is correct. They are also more informed about New Jersey tax law (no help from Fair Tax there.) People who joined Fair Tax's mailing list for information should not be counted as supporters of their agenda. It is because "Fair Tax" knows that people are accepting the result that they are beating their divisive drums all the louder. It would be manifestly unfair to postpone implementation of the revaluation, and I speak as a resident whose taxes are rising above 30 percent. No revaluation process is perfect. Another will yield the same results. I urge the TC to get on with the business of this town and simply ignore these people. To borrow their phrase, enough is enough. | ||
| Eliz |
I am also opposed to Fairtax's position and am strongly and vehemently opposed to their being involved in any review or sitting on any committee. These people were not elected and if they want that much involvement in TC affairs let them run for office next time.The reval must proceed and the numbers posted recently have convinced me that it is fair and any anomalies can be corrected on an individual basis.While I don't think the TC can "ignore" Fairtax they should only be treated as any private citizen and not as a group representing anyone's interest. | ||
| Townie |
Dear Eliz, You're right. The Mayor has already indicated on these boards that residents who call 762-8120 and leave a number where they can be reached will get a call back from him answering questions about the reval. But I don't believe the Mayor is any way obliged to give 30 minutes of time to the self-inflating "Fairtax." | ||
| Mfpark |
Townie: Your position in this thread is inconsistent with your statements in other postings, which is unfortunate because you have mainly taken a more reasoned tack in the other postings. The TC cannot ignore the voices of a sizeable minority of the Town who have legitimate questions about how the valuation was done. To ignore those questions is as deplorable as the way the some in the town told people who were overtaxed for years to not complain, that the Town would fix it some day. I am glad that you feel that your valuation is correct, but I am not sure what you base your opinion on. I imagine you look at your assessment, look at anecdotal evidence for sales in your immediate neighborhood, and feel that there is a reasonable correlation between them. That is great. Believe, me, many of the Fairtax people I have spoken with would love to be seeing only a 35% increase in their valuation. However, for others in town, they look at sales in their neighborhood and see glaring differences between the assessment and what they feel they can reasonably get for their homes on the market. Maybe they are right, maybe they are wrong. But because no one will share the assessment data with them (including actual sales comps and adjustments used to value their homes) they cannot have the confidence in the assessment that you do. While you are obviously knowledgeable enough about the market to not need to see the data, others are not so lucky and want to see how it was done. Why is that so wrong? How wrong is it to at least take the time to share that data with those who seek it? If so many in town are pleased with their assessments, as you say, then it should not take that long to let the rest review the data. This is not a nefarious scheme but an attempt to understand how the assessments were arrived at. And why not have a resident review board for assessments? We have a Community Budget Advisory Committee that works very closely and successfully with the Town on budgets. This is a marvelous town that welcomes citizen participation in so many ways--why not assistance in reviewing assessments? Perhaps such a review would have cured the overassessments for some neighborhoods years ago, rather than let that injustice fester for so long. Townie, of course no reval is perfect. And I am sure some who are vocal about the assessment would kick and scream about any increase in taxes. But most of the complainents I have spoken with do not have a privately concocted agenda. They simply want the comfort that you have that their assessment is reasonable. And to do that, they need to see the data and how it was used. In your other postings, you have advocated for people to have the right to challenge their assessment if they feel it is invalid. I believe that is really what Fairtax is asking for. But in order to exercise that right, people need the data, and the time to review it. How can we, even as individuals, submit a letter outlining errors in the process when we do not know what the process was? Sure, I can tell the assessor if my room count was wrong, but I cannot tell if they compared my house to a sale that was overimproved, or which had more land than mine. And an error in a comparable can affect value just as much as an error in room count or number of bathrooms. Without seeing what they compared my house with to get to market value, I cannot reasonably contest the valuation. If you truly believe in what you have previously said, then you will agree that at least as individuals people should have the right to review the comps and adjustments used to value their property (which will take a modest amount of time). On the other hand, if you simply want to sweep the issue under the rug on the premise that the majority is happy and to heck with the minority, if you are so cynical about the workings of democracy and minority rights, then there is little more one can say other than that this attitude will undermine this town in the name of simple expediency for the majority. And it raises the suspicion that either your taxes really are not going up 35%, or you somehow fear that if some are successful in challenging their assessments, your taxes might go up more than 35%. | ||
| Harold |
Townie, like a little cheese with your whine? | ||
| Townie |
Mfpark, I don't want people pressuring the independent assessor. He or she is supposed to be independent. These calls for yet more reviews of reviews by Fairtax are absurd. I don't believe they represent a "sizeable minority" of the town. Let them publish a list of names and maybe I'll believe, but not til then. I honestly don't think Fairtax is representing the best interests of people who may be entitled to adjustments in their assessments. I think homeowners who feel that they need adjustments in their assessments would do well to seek professional tax advice if they are still so suspicious of the process in place. And if they feel they need to get together as a neighborhood to challenge the reval as I neighborhood, I think they would be well advised to do so independently of Fairtax. Fairtax's bullying tone is obnoxious and they are trying to portray themselves as some group endorsed by citizens that the town's elected officials must deal with. Nonsense. As I indicated in my earlier post, they've been worried ever since the second letters from Certified went out because people lost interest in joining them in obstructing the town process. In other communications they've been more candid. Their slogan is: Reject and redo! As more and more people drift away, they reach for increasingly divisive rhetoric and ways to get what they want. I don't like what they're doing and I'm hoping the TC will reject and ignore their tactics. Fairtax's posturing is unbecoming and unhelpful. I don't know who they represent, but it is by no means all the people getting big tax increases. They've been sending out e-mails trying to keep all of us herded together, but we've done our own thinking and investigations, and we don't need them and we don't want them obstructing town business. I'm not worried that people who are owed legal adjustments in the assessment will get them. I want them to. Their entitled to it. I will pay my taxes whatever they are based on the fair market assessment of my home. I will continue support the level of services that the town needs, and weary of the e-mails sent out by Fairtax members saying that the "real fight" is slashing the town budget. People need to understand that no matter how many times "Fairtax" does the reval, calls the TC names, pores over the number or stands on its head and wiggles its feet, the fact will remain that the fair market value of homes in some areas of Maplewood went up much faster than that in other neighborhoods during the past 19 years. And some of us are getting big tax increases. The problem with Fairtax is that they are looking to blame somebody for reality. That's always a waste of everybody's time and energy. | ||
| Papa |
I just feel that the tc does not know how to procede,they seem to be floundering in there own muck, with no way out.they seem like thay can't make up there minds where to go from here,they are not a governing body at this point,they are doing damage control........papa | ||
| Njjoseph |
Townie and Eliz, I mostly agree with you. I cannot believe in this day and age that people have no idea what the market values of their homes are. Listings of comparables are everywhere, from the 2 real estate offices in town, the News-Record, the internet, etc. And I'm sure that a high percentage of these people are delighted to know that a comparable in their neighborhood was selling for $650K, thus validating the financial investment in their home. And then, when the reval says $550K or $600K, all the breaks are put on and the reval is flawed! If they put their houses on the market, how many of them would accept the dollar amount of the reval? Very few, I'm sure -- they want more! The reval is not flawed. Yes, there are a few homes that have incorrect amounts. However, somewhere along the line, it was stated that about 350 or 400 homes were overvalued. That's not even 6% of the homes in Maplewood! Not only that, but I went through my valuation with a fine tooth comb. If I nitpicked, the changes in valuation would only amount to $37 at the 2.75% rate. I think that the Maplewoodians who have really looked at the numbers, saw that a majority of homes (sales only) in the western end of town were valued at $50K to $100K below sales figures for 2000. My valuation is almost exactly what I paid for it this year -- can I get a 10% or 20% reduction like the west side did? I think NOT! And I shouldn't! I will not side with Fairtax, and I think they are wasting valuable time trying to fight the whole valuation when they could be spending the energy correcting individual mistakes. Everyone loses if the reval is thrown out. Not only will there be less sales in Maplewood until it's resolved, homeowners on the east side will win appeals (causing the rate to go up!), and there will be an additional $450K or $500K cost for redoing the valuation. I'm fed up. Can we now move on to other issues? | ||
| Melidere |
mfpark i'm not sure why you are unable to access the data you seek. jerry has made it available for all. That's why a lot of people are getting more comfortable...there is a lot of sales data there, readily available to be compared with valuations, that makes it pretty clear that there have been adjustments for the extreme sales on the west side . The only grounds for objecting at this point is on the grounds that taxing property based on it's value is an unfair method of taxation. That may or may not be true...(i keep waffling on that...i can see some benefits and some problems)...but it isn't a case for 'reject and redo'. Phase it in? Where is the money going to come from? | ||
| Yvette |
Melidere - The phase in money will come from the rest of us. The rate will go up to compensate the phase in. The phase in is 60% 1st yr (we will pick up the 40%), 20% 2nd yr, 20% 3rd yr. If a phase in is allowed then we will all lose! | ||
| Waynecaviness |
Whether or not you agree with the positions taken by the Fairtax folks, you surely must support their right to band together and seek redress for what they perceive as wrongs. Some, like Townie (a pretty consistent voice of reason on these threads), seem content with their assessments. Fine. Some, like Townie, are encouraging those who still have a grievance, real or perceived, to pursue those grievances on an individual basis. Fine. Where is it written that concerned citizens cant/shouldnt pursue redress as a group? Lets face it, many people feel that the TC has not handled this episode particularly well. Indeed, rightly or wrongly, it often appeared to the public that the TC was drug kicking and screaming into taking any action at all. Moreover, if it were not for the public efforts of Jerry Ryan and lately of Vic DeLuca, we might still be very much in the dark on many important aspects of this thing. I am on the Fairtax e-mail list (and indeed it is a pretty darned big one). While I don't agree with each and every item on their agenda, I do support their overall effort on behalf of Maplewood taxpayers. What better way to keep any governing body's "feet to the fire" than a group of organized, vocal citizens? To reiterate: The reval should proceed-it is the right thing to do. I don't believe that anyone objects to paying their fair tax. But they must feel confident that the tax that they are being asked to pay is indeed fair and arrived at in a fair and equitable manner. Recent actions by the TC are steps in the right direction. Whether or not other actions are necessary remains to be seen. | ||
| Eliz |
Of course they can band together and try to right whatever perceived wrongs they wish. However I object to it being assumed that they act on behalf of Maplewood taxpayers. They act on behalf of a select group of taxpayers. I also don't think you can assume that their entire email list supports the letter they posted above based on the fact that several people who are on the list have voiced their opinion that the reval should proceed. | ||
| Mfpark |
Melidere: The point you are missing is that I do not know WHICH comparable sales were used for my house valuation. Looking at all sales in the town or in my neighborhood does not tell me which ones were used by the assessor to value my house. I am a trained appraiser, so looking at the data being posted is not foreign to me at all. I know how the appraisal process works, and I know that errors can easily be made in choosing comps. The fact that I can look at the mass of sales data and get a general idea as to what a 4 BR, 3 BA house goes for in my neighborhood does not mean that I can value my house. People buying houses value other things, such as condition of the house, condition of kitchen/bath, amount of backyard, etc. If you choose the wrong comp (say, one with a large backyard and new kitchen for a house with no backyard and a dysfunctional kitchen), then you will skew the assessment upwards. Of course, this works the other way, as well, although I doubt anyone with a "sense" that their assessment is less than fair market value will challenge the data! Obviously I think that I could not sell my house for the assessed value--in fact, several brokers I asked to list the house last summer agree, and believe me, they were looking for listings at that time and being aggressive on their opinion of sales prices. My challenge to the assessment is not that basing school funding on property taxes is unjust (which it is, and which I continue to research how to change)--it is that I cannot make a meaningfull challenge when I cannot examine the appraisal process. Looking at the reams of data on recent sales is great for a generalized sense of market values, and I am glad that your assessment feels reasonable to you. I can tell you that looking at that data makes me feel that my property is likely overvalued. But how can I know for sure unless I know how they valued my property--that is, what comps they actually used and how they adjusted them to match my property? By the way, I am not calling for a redo of the reval--only for transparency in the process. It is incredibly frustrating that you, Townie, and others continue to confuse the discussion of getting data and being able to understand the process with a total abolition of the reval. Fairtax is the first to admit that it does not speak for the whole town, or even for those of us still contesting our valuations. Transparency of data is one part of the Fairtax position, and to throw this out with the whole position is ridiculous. I guarantee that if you felt that your house was significantly overvalued (even after the mystical neighborhood adjustments and seeing the mass sales data), you would demand to know how someone came to that conclusion before you wanted to write the first check. | ||
| Njjoseph |
Mfpark, did you get your property card yet? Maybe you could explain what you see. I am under the impression that in the cost approach, things like square footage and type of heat, garages, porches, roofs, etc. are the driving force in the calculations. Then each "asset" is multiplied by a specific factor to come up with the cost. I am under the impression that these items should be relatively constant across all houses in Maplewood, for like assets. For example, the multiplier for hot water heat should be 1.25 for all Maplewoodians, a 3-fixture average bath would be 855.0 (I'm sure a new bath would be higher). Another example is that a first story with sheetrock would be 15.84 a square foot, and plaster could be different. Therefore, I don't think that specific houses are used as comps for purposes of this revaluation. I think the biggest differences are in land values, number and age of bathrooms, age of house (for the depreciation factor), etc. I've listed land first, because I believe location is the prime difference. After all, why could I buy my house for $300K LESS than a SMALLER house on Wyoming? Please let us know if you think my assumptions are mistaken. Thanks! | ||
| Mfpark |
Njjoseph: I frankly am as tired as everyone else of this whole thing, but as a former teacher of real estate courses, I want to at least share with you (and anyone else with the stomach to read on) some of the theory underlying the cost approach to real estate valuation. I hope that the next time any of us face an assessment, we will be more knowledgeable about the process. I think you are correct to a degree, but I have a problem with the cost approach driving valuations. This approach is notoriously inexact and does not reflect how the market actually values properties. And it should include a lot of market comparable data anyway, as shown below, and then I want to be able to examine it. But this does not show on a data card. Remember, the goal of any appraisal--for financing, assessment, or purchasing--is to estimate how the free and open market would price a given property at a given point in time. This is at best an art, but there are better and worse ways to do it. The cost approach is one of the less realistic views of how the market prices properties. The premise of the cost approach is that no one would pay more for a property than it would cost to replace it. This means pricing the land through comparable sales analysis of vacant land sales (or through the extraction method--take the sales price of the entire property as improved, remove the cost to build the structure on the land, and the remainder is the value of the land). To the land value is added the cost of building a replacement or reproduction of the improvements on that land. But this is not how people buy houses. People buy houses by a) choosing a neighborhood they want to live in (which is wrapped up in the site value), b) comparing prices of alternative available properties on the market, c) factoring in their overall cost of housing and affordability, and d) the attributes of the house they are looking at (i.e, the market approach to value). They do not typically ask how much it would cost to replace a building and set their price accordingly. There are also technical problems with the cost approach. In the cost approach, it is next to impossible to account for functional depreciation for older houses (how much to deduct because a kitchen has not been renovated, for example). We know that buyers will pay less for a house where they have to renovate the kitchen than one that has a renovated kitchen with a modern layout (layout is more important than appliances, which can be easily replaced). The way to estimate functional depreciation is to find two house sales that are relatively similar in all aspects except that one has a renovated kitchen, the other does not. You then test to see if there is a value difference between them (you would expect the unrenovated kitchen sale to be lower) and use this as a measure of functional obsolescence for kitchens. Of course, this means using a market comp approach to adjust the cost approach, so I want to see if this was done and if so, how was it done. Actually, my suspicion is that it was not done at all, and that no accounting for functional obsolescence was attempted because it is very very difficult to do with any reasonable degree of accuracy. In the cost approach, it is also difficult to estimate physical depreciation for old houses. Clearly houses in Maplewood are both very old (about 70 years for many) and a lot "younger" than their physical age. They have been maintained. They have been renovated. Appraisers use relatively broad depreciation factors for age, but how can we tell if the factor used for one house fits another? If one house has been substantially renovated, then it is much less depreciated than one that has only been maintained. Not surprisingly, the renovated house will sell for more. And if a house has been well-maintained but not renovated, it will sell for more than one that was neglected, all other factors being equal. And, so, it is back to matched pairs of sales to determine the effect of renovation and maintenance. Again, I doubt this was done (because it is difficult and time consuming and costly), but if so, I want to see the comps to see how it was done. Finally, land value is also hard to estimate where land sales rarely occur, as in our market. If you do use comps for land sales, this is the market approach, and I want to see the comps to make sure they conform to my land (or were adjusted to account for differences). If it is the land extraction method, then I want to see which comps they used so I can determine if they are reasonably comparable to my property--if the sale comp was significantly different, then the cost to replace it that is deducted from the sales price will yield a very different land value than my property would yield. To sum up, the cost approach is most appropriate where you have a special use building with few or no comparable sales (for example, super-reinforced, top-secret R&D facility for military weapons testing). Because of the difficulty in estimating functional and physical depreciation, it is not very appropriate where the market has enough sales to use the market approach to value. Also, the cost and time involved in making accurate depreciation adjustments rules out its use for mass valuations. I am sure CVI knows how to make the adjustments, but they could not do so and still make much money on this assignment and so they were likely not done with any degree of accuracy for each property. So, that is why I do not agree with the cost approach writ large. The fact that you can state generic factors for a bathroom or sheetrock ignores the fact that the existing properties you are valuing are very different in terms of how the market values them. | ||
| Njjoseph |
Your discussion makes sense, but I wonder if the multipliers include things that would account for some of the tangibles, i.e. renovated kitchen v. average kitchen, etc., and may go into location as well. After all, there are spots for these things to be checked off on the property card. Have you received yours, yet? If so, we can compare some of the multipliers. | ||
| Fairtax01 |
"townie" - re your quotes: [FairTax] speaks for themselves and have a privately concocted agenda" Please finish that thought. What e-mail from FairTax ever said the "real fight" (your quotes attributed to fairtax) is slashing the town budget? What are you referring to? Please produce that e-mail from FairTax or cease making up quotes and falsely attributing them to FairTax. With the "blanket" reductions, many houses are even more mis-assessed than before. For example: a house "on the hill" sold in Sept. 2000 for $530K, assessed in Dec. for $510K, now it's assessed at $460K. That's not a fair assessment either. Who's going to pay for these errors? Everyone; Those whose taxes should go down, those who should stay the same, and those who should increase. We've received several e-mails lately from people who have said that now their assessments are now lower than they should be. That was never our objective. It's wrong that people who should receive legitimate tax reductions will be paying a bit more because the assessment was hastily redone. | ||
| Waynecaviness |
Mfpark, Thanks very much for a very informative post. Most of the facets of valuations appear to be common sense but also seem to require a fair amount of specialized knowledge of facts (e.g., comparables) to implement. The fact that a great deal of that "comparables" knowledge is not exactly transparent to the majority of us has, IMHO, contributed greatly to the angst over this reval process. Certified's attitude has only exacerbated the situation. There is simply no equivalent of a stock exchange ticker tape conveniently displaying price and time within seconds of a transaction. Yes, we can examine the public records somewhat after the fact for price and date of sale and some of the gross physical characteristics (lot size, number of rooms, etc.) but it appears quite difficult to know those details that often form the basis of relative valuations (e.g., renovations, age of renovations, condition of interior, etc.). Realtors and appraisers add value through their knowledge of those factors. Presumably, many have been contacted in recent weeks! Thanks again. | ||
| Townie |
To Citizen and Fairtax: My basic problem with what you do is that you have been a source of misinformation, divisiveness and unhelpful tactics and non-solutions. What appeared in the beginning to be an understandable groping in the face of understandable confusion has turned into petulance and pettiness and getting in the way of people who really are trying to move this process forward fairly. You don't understand texes, the real estate market, the town, state law or politics. Instead of listening, you've been shouting. You haven't even been reading your own e-mail. I find J.L. Nathenson a pedantic writer and many of your e-mail correspondents just confused so my abbreviation of the Fairtax e-mail discussions of its real agenda into the more simple what the "real fight" is about seemed only a public service to fellow board readers. But since you asked, here's some sample quotes from e-mails I've read that have come from the your e-mail list: "While the revaluation is the immediate issue which must be addressed, over time the real driver of tax increases is the spending side of the equation. So whatever the outcome of the revaluation fight, the continuing challenge will be on budgets and spending." "I have always felt that fighting this tax increase on the assessment alone may not be the winning course. Of course it is the most current priority but that alone may still leave us with a large and unbearable increase." "Unified force is a powerful and scary thing if you are on the receiving end, and that's just where you want the TC to be, both mentally and physically after tomorrow night..." "It probably has taken the faulty assessment to wake the masses(me included) but we should not allow this moment of public awareness to slip away. Regardless of the outcome of our tax problem lets please keep all of our communication systems that have been formed, together." blah blah blah blah. Real town builders, aren't they? The people who have been sincerely looking to help others in this reval confusion have been showing other people where they could find the right information, where they could go over the numbers themselves, and like others here have been pointing out, taking advantage of all the disclosure -- yes, honest disclosure -- the TC has provided. They are not just bashers. People who have real assessment problems don't need what Fairtax is providing, more hot air than helpfulness, and which has included, right from the start, more misinformation than reliable information. They thought they could phase-in the reval, have a class action suit about it, said the town wasn't giving out information. They went to meetings where important information was given out and never heard it and certainly never helped distribute it. Instead, they tried to get the rest of us mad at the TC for not mailing us all a postcard about it. And they come on these boards to post ukases demanding the TC toss of its cloak of secrecy, while other people crunch the avalanche of numbers provided by Jerry Ryan, share what they've discovered and talk about getting together to go over things together. I hope nobody in Fairtax who knows their assessment is correct (and plenty do, because I got an e-mail right after I got my adjusted assessment from Certified saying that even though assessments were coming into line with reality, rejecting and redoing the reval was still their priority) they are not clogging up the process that was set in place for Maplewood residents with genuine assessment problems. And dear Fairtax people: get your nose out of everybody's else's assessments and stop the pretense that your performing some kind of noble act by doing so. I think everyone sees you just want to keep the waters muddied, not clear up anything. It's too bad: You went from being a possible source of needed information to a shrill, unhelpful source of political scheming. I think there may be solutions for people who want to work together. But you don't sound like people who want to work with the town. You just want to push what you want. |
