Delco told to turn over records on reassessment
The Pennsylvania Office of Open Records has entered a final determination directing Delaware County to turn over certain records relating to a countywide reassessment of property values.
The agency made the ruling in response to a request from a Delaware County citizen, Michael Marcavage of Lansdowne.
No one from the county responded to a request for comment.
Delaware County Court of Common Pleas Judge Charles B. Burr ordered the reassessment in March 2017 to address an apparent lack of uniformity in violation of the Pennsylvania Constitution. The issue came to surface after a pair of assessment appeals filed by James and Lenore Kaufman of Rose Valley, and Peter and Ellen Bodenheimer of Haverford, challenging the county’s process for determining home assessments.
County Council contracted Tyler Technologies, who administered a previous assessment 20 years ago, to once again place monetary values on properties within the county. Tyler is being paid $6 million for their work on the countywide reassessment, which is expected to become effective for the 2021 tax year.
The county began mailing out “tentative” assessments earlier this year. Marcavage submitted a request to the county on Feb. 18 under the Right-to-Know Law seeking copies of tentative assessment change notices sent to property owners at certain addresses, according to the order filed March 30. He alternatively sought a copy of an excel spreadsheet or other electronic document for Collingdale, Lansdowne and East Lansdowne that was used to generate information in the letters, the order says.
The county denied the request, arguing that it did not have possession of the requested records. Marcavage appealed to the OOR, which allowed both sides to supplement the record before reaching a determination.
The order notes Delaware County appeared to have abandoned the argument that it did not have possession of the records during the appeals process, acknowledging that it had contracted with Tyler to perform the assessment. The RTKL provides that public records in the possession of third parties are subject to disclosure where the third party performs a governmental function on behalf of the agency and the records are directly related to that function.
The county instead pivoted to argue that the requested records here reflect “internal, predecisional deliberations” that are exempt under the RTKL, according to the order. For that exemption to apply, the county had to satisfy three factors: That the records were “internal” to a governmental agency; the deliberations reflected were predecisional; and the contents were deliberative in character.
But as Delaware County Clerk and Open Records Officer Anne Coogan stated in an affidavit, the notices of tentative assessment change and tentative property values requested by Marcavage were provided by Tyler to a printer, which sent them directly to property owners.
The county also indicates in its brief that the purpose of the letters is to allow property owners to engage in an informal review process with Tyler in its mission of determining final assessment values.
“Therefore, as both evidence and uncontradicted assertions demonstrate, the letters are not internal to the county,” the order concluded. “As the records do not satisfy the first element of the test, they cannot be exempt as records reflecting internal, predecisional deliberations.”
The OOR decision is binding, but the county may appeal the decision to the Delaware County Court of Common Pleas.