The Habersham County Board of Tax Assessors is not commenting on news Now Habersham broke Thursday about an apparent scheduling error that forced the county to refund nearly $334,000 in taxes.
Deputy chief appraiser Amy Garmon says her office is gathering more information about what led up to the county’s failure to schedule eight appeal hearings that resulted in the tax forfeiture.
In a letter dated November 30, the Board of Tax Assessors asked Habersham County Clerk of Court David Wall to review his office’s procedures related to the matter.
“Our office forwarded to your office several Hearing Officer Appeals from 2019 and 2020 that are required to be heard within 180 days of the date of filing. We were notified after the deadline had elapsed that a Hearing Officer could not be located,” the letter states. “This resulted in 8 appeals, several of which involved multiple tracks, impacting the county by the appellant receiving their asserted value in the amount of $66,667,519.00. This oversight has resulted in Habersham County refunding $333,837.64 to the 8 appeals.”
The letter was signed by the board of assessors members Mariah Holbrooks, Denise York, Jim Kiger, Amy Sgro, and Barry Trotter. They encouraged Wall to review office procedures “regarding this situation to prevent future occurrences and to prevent further penalties to the taxpayers of our county.”
Wall could not be reached for comment Friday. A staff member in the clerk’s office told Now Habersham he was out of the office.
Habersham County Manager Alicia Vaughn has scheduled a press briefing Monday to answer questions about the matter. Now Habersham will be in attendance. Check back here for updates.
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