Bear's Nest Condominium Ass'n v. Bergen County Board of Taxation

25 N.J. Tax 237
CourtNew Jersey Tax Court
DecidedOctober 19, 2009
StatusPublished

This text of 25 N.J. Tax 237 (Bear's Nest Condominium Ass'n v. Bergen County Board of Taxation) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering New Jersey Tax Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Bear's Nest Condominium Ass'n v. Bergen County Board of Taxation, 25 N.J. Tax 237 (N.J. Super. Ct. 2009).

Opinion

PIZZUTO, J.T.C.

Defendants have moved to dismiss this action, which was brought to obtain review of the approval by the Bergen County Board of Taxation (County Board) of a partial re-assessment of taxable real property within the Borough of Park Ridge for tax [239]*239year 2006. At the time the motions were filed, Bear’s Nest Condominium Association (Association) was joined as plaintiff together with owners of two condominium units within the Bear’s Nest complex. The claims of those owners have since been voluntarily dismissed and the Association is now the sole plaintiff.

N.J.S.A. 54:4-23, in particular the amendment to that statute enacted as L. 2001, c. 101 (commonly known as “Chapter 101”), governs re-assessment of all or part of the taxable real property within a given taxing district. The statute requires an assessor who wishes to conduct a full or partial re-assessment to obtain the approval of the County Board of Taxation, and the regulations adopted thereunder by the Director of the Division of Taxation (N.J.A.C. 18:12A-1.14) prescribe procedures and establish standards for obtaining approval.

In the instant matter, the pleadings disclose the following uncontested facts. In November 2005, the assessor sought approval to re-assess all 199 condominium units at Bear’s Nest at an aggregate 5% increase and all 114 units at another condominium complex at a 6% increase. The condominium complexes were identified not by name but by numerical locality or neighborhood designations. On December 14, 2005, the County Board gave its approval. The assessor completed the re-assessment and included the revised assessments in the proposed tax list for 2006 submitted to the County Board. The affected unit owners received specific notice that their property was being re-assessed, and received a formal notice of assessment, required to be given by N.J.S.A. 54:4-38.1 (commonly known as the “Chapter 75 Notice”) not later than February 1, 2006 so that the time for filing a conventional tax appeal under N.J.S.A. 54:3-21 on any re-assessed unit ran through Monday, April 3, 2006.

The pleadings further disclose that the Association and several of its members requested the County Board to set aside the new assessments and return the affected units to their 2005 assessments, since the 2005 assessment level had generally been preserved in 2006 for the property in Park Ridge that had not been re-assessed. They tendered various arguments in support of this [240]*240request to the County Board and the Association seeks to pursue those arguments in the Tax Court. They contended, for example, that the unit owners were not specifically advised that the reassessment affected only the two condominium complexes and were thereby led to believe that a general revaluation was being conducted in Park Ridge. They further contended that there was insufficient basis to conclude that the affected units required reassessment and that other property in Park Ridge deviated from the general assessment level to a greater extent. The County Board in an action taken on March 8, 2006, rejected the request, in a summary fashion without addressing the subject matter, and left the objectors to seek relief in this court. This action, filed on April 17, 2006, followed.

Defendants’ arguments for dismissal are, essentially, that the 2006 assessments placed on the affected condominium units are subject to review only in timely filed tax appeals of individual units, that this plaintiff lacks standing to question the assessments as a group and that its action is, in any event, untimely. Plaintiff responds that the March 8 action is reviewable as an exercise of the County Board’s authority to approve the re-assessment, that the approval was improper, and that the time within which review could be sought was forty-five days, the period fixed for review of County Board actions in the Tax Court by N.J.S.A. 54:51A-9 and R. 8:4-l(a)(l).

Plaintiff’s arguments are not persuasive and defendants’ motions to dismiss are granted. A decisive flaw in plaintiffs argument is its characterization of the March 8 action as a determination which can be the subject of review in this court. When the County Board denied plaintiffs request to restore the 2005 assessments, it was not taking formal action. Its decision to accept the partial re-assessment under Chapter 101 had already been made.

The new assessments had been disclosed in the Chapter 75 notices sent to Park Ridge taxpayers as of February 1, 2006, and had been included in the tax list presumably submitted by the assessor not later than January 10 under N.J.S.A. 54:4-35. The [241]*241assessments remained subject to change by the County Board in the exercise of its administrative authority to revise and correct the tax list and deliver a finally certified list to the municipal collectors by June 3. N.J.S.A. 54:4-55. If an assessment is so revised, a notice of changed assessment is required under N.J.S.A. 54:4-38.1 and review of the revised assessment may be taken by appeal under N.J.S.A. 54:3-21 to the County Board or the Tax Court within forty-five days of the notice of change. Unless an assessment is changed subsequent to the initial Chapter 75 notice, the time for appeal is determined from the date of initial notice and, in the case of Park Ridge in 2006, ran through April 3.

Neither authority nor reason support the argument that an unsuccessful request for an assessment change that occurs between the Chapter 75 notice and the appeal date determinable thereunder extends the time for appeal. Timely filing of a tax assessment appeal is a jurisdictional requirement that is strictly enforced. F.M.C. Stores Co. v. Bomugh of Morris Plains, 100 N.J. 418, 495 A.2d 1313 (1985); Danis v. Middlesex County Board of Taxation, 113 N.J.Super. 6, 272 A.2d 542 (App.Div.1971); Regent Care Center, Inc. v. Hackensack City, 18 N.J.Tax 320 (1999). It is part of the statutory pattern for the orderly assessment and collection of tax revenue which is essential to the operation of local government. Township of Holmdel v. New Jersey Highway Authority, 190 N.J. 74, 918 A.2d 603 (2007).

The allowance of an otherwise untimely appeal in this matter by computing the time period under R. 8:4 — 1(a)(1) from the date of the denial of the request for an assessment change on March 6 clearly subverts the considerations underlying the general statute of limitations for tax appeals. There is, moreover, no question of prejudice in the present case. The plaintiff had fully adequate notice of the new assessments, and that they were imposed under Chapter 101. It submitted its request and arguments to the County Board and received the Board’s response almost a month before April 3. Whatever the dimensions of the right of any party to seek review of the implementation of a partial re-assessment under Chapter 101, for the reasons above stated, an action seeking [242]*242such review must be filed within the time allowed for contesting individual assessments.1

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Bluebook (online)
25 N.J. Tax 237, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/bears-nest-condominium-assn-v-bergen-county-board-of-taxation-njtaxct-2009.