PITTSBURGH – An appeals court upheld a tax reassessment on a couple's property, backing a lower court's decision to dismiss their complaint – even though the lower court was deemed wrong in its reasoning for dismissal.
Joseph and Ester Martel had filed a class action lawsuit against Allegheny County, Pittsburgh Public Schools, the Allegheny County Board of Assessment Appeals and Review and the City of Pittsburgh in 2017 after seeing their property's value for tax purposes increased by more than $230,000 the year after they bought it.
The Martels bought the property in 2015 for $750,000. It carried an assessed value of $467,400 based on its last appraisal, in 2012. In 2016, Public Schools asked the county board to reassess the property, “though, at the time, ‘there had been no material additions or removal of improvements'" to the property, according to the ruling. The board reassessed the property at $690,000.
The Martels appealed the decision to the Court of Common Pleas Board of Viewers, a case that remains ongoing, but they also filed their lawsuit in the Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas, alleging the tax board did not have the authority to initiate a review based solely upon market value of the property – that local statutes reserved that right for taxpayers alone.
The defendants objected, claiming there was no basis for a class action and that there could be no lawsuit because the Martels' case was ongoing, so they had not exhausted their statutory remedies.
The trial court dismissed the Martels' suit, saying the local statutes the Martels cited are invalid because they contradict authority granted to the tax board. It also dismissed the matter as a class action because there were no other claimants. The Martels appealed the decision to the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania.
The Commonwealth Court concluded that the lower court's reasoning for dismissal were incorrect -- that the Martels did have a right to lodge their complaint – but said the proper venue for the case was before the county's Appeals Board, so it upheld the court's decision to dismiss the case.
Judge Christine Fizzano Cannon wrote the ruling.
Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania / Court N. 568 C.D. 2018