Tax Assessments

Joseph Polya of Rydal acknowledges that he has increased his wealth in the last few years. But it came as a bit of a surprise when he received his 1987 assessment from the Montgomery County personal-property tax department putting his worth at $6.2 million. For the second time in four years, the county had stated incorrectly that Polya's assets totaled more than $6 million. Polya estimated his assets at $200,000 in taxable securities. Polya is not alone. In Abington Township, more than 10 percent of personal- property owners were assessed incorrectly - some at larger amounts.

The Granite Run Mall, Scott Paper Co., and Sears, Roebuck & Co. in Millbourne have appealed parts of their tax assessments this fall, joining a host of other large county businesses that have done so in recent years. The latest appeals, which will be heard this month and in October, would affect the Interboro School District, the Rose Tree Media School District, and the Borough of Millbourne, among others. "Good grief," said Millbourne council member Dorothy MacNeil when told that Sears planned to appeal the tax assessment on its empty store there.

The city's judges fired Joseph A. Russo from the Board of Revision of Taxes yesterday, after a scathing report from the city inspector general said he had manipulated property assessments, abused his power, and committed perjury. The sudden firing of Russo, a longtime ally of former State Sen. Vincent J. Fumo, appeared to be unprecedented in the 155-year history of the BRT, the agency that sets tax values for all properties in Philadelphia. "He did not uphold the standards expected of appointees," President Judge Pamela Pryor Dembe said.

The city Board of Revision of Taxes plans to re-evaluate its tax assessments of all homes in the Regency Hill development of Somerton as the result of a meeting last week between board officials and City Councilman Brian J. O'Neill. O'Neill, who requested the meeting Wednesday, said the board would take a second look at the market value it assigned to all 48 occupied homes in the development because they had a total of 350 unrepaired code violations and many also lacked a city-required certificate of use and occupancy.

EVER SINCE shockingly high property tax assessments first started appearing in people's mailboxes, the Board of Revision of Taxes and chairman David Glancey have been the target of critics, especially on City Council. Councilman Frank DiCicco, in particular, has been especially tough in his remarks that the BRT is flawed in the way it conducts assessments. DiCicco illustrated his point when he asked the BRT for the addresses of people in his district for a mass mailing and 30,000 letters were returned with bad addresses.

Cinnaminson Township's proposed $5.4 million budget for 1991 would include an overall increase of more than 31 percent in property taxes. The rise was brought on by increased tax delinquencies and higher insurance rates, according to township officials, and might prompt layoffs of municipal employees and school crossing guards. Under the spending plan introduced last week, the local purpose tax would be 21.6 cents for each $100 of assessed property value. The old rate was 32.2 cents, but many residents could pay higher taxes for 1991 because property assessments recently rose 120 percent.

The Springfield school board has responded to a lawsuit that seeks to unseat eight of its members by filing a lawsuit of its own. D. Barry Gibbons, the district's attorney, said Thursday that he had filed an "abuse of process" suit against the 10 district residents who sued the school board. The residents contend that the school board violated the state school code by adopting school budgets that appropriate more than 25 mills worth of property tax revenue for expenses other than professional salaries.

Easttown officials on Monday proposed a 6 percent increase in spending in next year's township budget and only a slight tax increase to fund library operations. During a brief budget hearing at the supervisors' meeting, board Chairman Samuel Pilotti said there would be no tax increase to meet township operating expenses and that the township's total expenses for next year are budgeted at $3,375,000 compared with a 1988 operating budget of $3.2 million. According to township manager Gene Williams, the general fund tax will remain the same because of additional revenue generated by the township's real estate transfer tax. Williams said the 6 percent increase in spending resulted from the inflated costs of "general operating materials and supplies for the township.

East Nantmeal Township Supervisor Nick Tkaczuk is concerned that there may be a thief among the residents who attend meetings at the township building. The alleged thefts have one thing in common: They all involve public documents. Tkaczuk said he noticed meeting minutes had disappeared from their envelope, which hangs on a bulletin board in the back of the meeting room in the former schoolhouse. Also missing is the township's tax duplicate. The document - a list of every property and property owner in the township, used to make tax assessments - was last seen resting on the supervisors' table after a Historical Commission meeting last month.

Administrators in the Methacton School District say the district will lose a substantial amount of tax revenue - perhaps as much as $336,833 - as a result of businesses challenging property-tax assessments. Since July, commercial property owners have challenged their tax assessments in Board of Assessment Appeals Court and have won reductions on 11 properties. The reductions amount to more than $1.15 million in property values, said board Solicitor John Rafferty at Tuesday night's board meeting.

The Board of Revision of Taxes is hanging by a thread, and on May 18 Philadelphia voters will be handed a pair of scissors. If they approve in next week's primary, the BRT will be disbanded, bringing an end to the troubled 156-year-old agency, whose work helps determine the tax due on every property in Philadelphia. "Any Philadelphian who cares about a fair, accurate, legitimate property-assessment system should vote yes on this ballot question," Mayor Nutter said. "Any citizen who is horrified by the activities and operations of the BRT and its board should be voting yes on this ballot question.

The Board of Revision of Taxes is hanging by a thread, and on May 18 Philadelphia voters will be handed a pair of scissors. If they approve in next week's primary, the BRT will be disbanded, bringing an end to the troubled 156-year-old agency, whose work helps determine the tax due on every property in Philadelphia. "Any Philadelphian who cares about a fair, accurate, legitimate property-assessment system should vote yes on this ballot question," Mayor Nutter said. "Any citizen who is horrified by the activities and operations of the BRT and its board should be voting yes on this ballot question.

The six members of the beleaguered Board of Revision of Taxes defended their management of the agency, the role of patronage in its operations, and the performance of their employees at a hearing yesterday. Aggrieved and defiant, the board members faulted City Council and the Nutter administration for Philadelphia's inequitable and inaccurate property-tax-assessment system, and said The Inquirer and the good-government watchdog Committee of Seventy had unfairly tarnished their reputations.

The historic deal that promises to remake the property-assessment system in Philadelphia started with a meeting between the city's powerful Democratic leader and a sick old man. U.S. Rep. Robert A. Brady, the party chief, got a call from Enrico "Ricky" Foglia, the 80-year-old executive director of the Board of Revision of Taxes. They went way back, coming up in politics together in the 34th Ward in Overbrook. As they sat together at the ward clubhouse on Haverford Avenue, Brady was gentle.

In the first substantial fix for Philadelphia's broken property-tax system in more than a century, the troubled Board of Revision of Taxes agreed yesterday to surrender responsibility for setting tax values. Mayor Nutter announced that the BRT board had agreed to allow the city finance director to take charge of running the agency and oversee a long-delayed makeover of its tax assessments, widely considered among the least accurate in the nation. Under the agreement, which takes effect immediately, the board members keep their part-time positions, their $70,000 salaries, and the responsibility for deciding tax appeals.

In the first substantial fix for Philadelphia's broken property-tax system in more than a century, the troubled Board of Revision of Taxes agreed yesterday to surrender responsibility for setting tax values. Mayor Nutter announced that the BRT board had agreed to allow the city finance director to take charge of running the agency and oversee a long-delayed makeover of its tax assessments, widely considered among the least accurate in the nation. Under the agreement, which takes effect immediately, the board members keep their part-time positions, their $70,000 salaries, and the responsibility for deciding tax appeals.

For the last 20 years, the city's property-assessment agency has listed the building at 5901 Woodbine Ave. as a Jewish nonprofit day-care center. Since it was a religious institution, the tax bill was zero. But unnoticed by the Board of Revision of Taxes, the day-care center moved out a decade ago. Since then, the new owners - for-profit real estate investors - have been collecting rent from new tenants, and should have been paying taxes of $10,000 a year, according to a new audit released yesterday by the City Controller's Office.

For the last 20 years, the city's property-assessment agency has listed the building at 5901 Woodbine Ave. as a Jewish nonprofit day-care center. Since it was a religious institution, the tax bill was zero. But unnoticed by the Board of Revision of Taxes, the day-care center moved out a decade ago. Since then, the new owners - for-profit real estate investors - have been collecting rent from new tenants, and should have been paying taxes of $10,000 a year, according to a new audit released yesterday by the City Controller's Office.

The economy is reeling and the real estate market is in shambles, but these are boom times for the 900 block of Kimball Street. At least that is the view of the city Board of Revision of Taxes. Ten houses on this tidy but typical South Philadelphia block abutting the Italian Market were slapped with property-assessment increases ranging from 25 percent to 236 percent late last month, changes that will triple the real estate tax bills of the hardest-hit homeowners. Such knee-buckling increases would be tough to take at any time, but now that the agency itself has acknowledged that its assessment system is deeply flawed, the residents of Kimball Street are furious at being asked to pay so much more.