Highlights from Town Council tonight -- the wacky public hearing on DCAD and appraisals
I give our Town Council a lot of credit for holding tonight's public hearing on property appraisals. Perhaps you know already that the Town doesn't have any real say over how appraisals are done. The Town sets a tax rate, but what you wind up paying each year depends on how much your property is worth. And that duty falls upon the Denton Central Appraisal District. They're the ones who set property values each year.
The hearing went a couple of hours, and it was quite colorful at times. Mayor Pro Tem Joel Lindsey tried to follow the normal procedure for public hearings and gave constant reminders that individual property cases would not be heard, but that didn't stop several people from trying to go freestyle.
Some thoughts from my living-room viewing:
1) It was quite noble for DCAD officials to come to the hearing, and to stay for all of it. They took a lot of heat. Perhaps some of it is deserved, but I don't know. All I know is what I've read (mostly in The News Connection. I've not had issues with my own appraisals in recent years, so I haven't done much investigation. Our home has stayed pretty consistent throughout the 6 years we've lived here.
2) Someone please give our neighbor Jack Stufflebam a copy of Robert's Rules of Order. And a stopwatch. And what was up with that rogue Powerpoint he sprung on the meeting?
3) Why did they let these out-of-Towner citizen complainers take up our Town's valuable time? Were these guys "ringers" brought in for emphasis?
4) Council members Tim Trotter and Joel Lindsey did a good job of trying to keep the meeting focused on general appraisal-district policies and procedures. It was a hard fight, against hordes of people wanting to have their own individual grievances heard.
I know at least a few regular readers of this blog were there at the meeting tonight. I only watched it on TV. What did you see or hear? Post a comment below.
posted by Chip Mahaney @ 11:43 PM
4 comments
4 Comments:
I thought Council Member Jeff Tasker was a bit out of line at the end. It looked like he was just upset Stufflebaum's presentation included the councilmember's appraisals. Tasker contended that Stufflebaum included them to insinuate impropriety. (However, although tactless, I thought he included them merely as reference points to show how other DCAD "whistleblowers" were retaliated against.)
But Tasker's tone made me squirm. He kept telling the citizens to hire an attorney (but economics will not dictate hiring an attorney) and to basically contact every government representative but Flower Mound's city council, as he thought everyone was bringing up individual grievances.
But I think a major point was missed by both the councilmembers and the citizens--a faulty appraisal system potentially affects every citizen. It might be Stufflebaum this year, while it could be you or me next year. And just because my particular appraisal is in line, does not mean I believe the system works as it should.
Finally, the citizens bring up their own appraisal issues because that is the only pure evidence they have of a faulty appraisal system. As the DCAD said, Texas is a non-disclosure state concerning home sales. So, if the DCAD has a hard time getting information, how is the regular citizen supposed to compile other information besides their own? The evidence was individual, but the issue was not.
This is not a town fight..it's not even a county fight....its a state fight. On the same day as the town's public hearing, the Governon announced a new task force to address appraisal issues.
http://www.governor.state.tx.us/divisions/press/pressreleases/PressRelease.2006-08-21.2109
I'm a DCAD insider. Honestly, I'm ashamed by lack of professionalism at the district.
DCAD is a hold back to the ol' boys club and all of the misdeeds of it's management reflect poorly upon the organization as a whole.
For instance, the head of HR hired her daughter (different last name) and the daughter works in the same department as her mom. Nepotism at its worst.
The Senior Appraiser in Personal property hires only members of her church or the children of her best friend. Again, a different form of nepotism.
The Chief Appraiser changed the rules regarding reporting auto allowance. Why? So he or the other 'tools' in his administration don't get hit with the income tax. This has been going on for years. Why does he trade-in his car so often?
Properties of well-connected landowners sitting on multi-million dollar properties in southern Denton County go un-taxed or barely taxed with an AG exemption while the average home owner gets taken to the cleaners. The school districts loose here.
Now, most of the folks at DCAD are honest hard working people, but they need their jobs. The veiled threats of thier managers to not speak to the press or state officials create a world of mis-trust and unprofessional if not illegal behavior.
Supervisors have attempted to gain access to email accounts of thier employees to see what they were sayng about them.
Former employees are suing after being dismissed for minor infractions with out warning.
Its really a bizzarre place to work.
The above post is dated 12/18/07
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