SC Administrative Law Court Decisions

STATEMENT OF THE CASE

The above-captioned case was brought by Petitioner T.D. Powell, LLC, to challenge Respondent Orangeburg County Assessor’s (Assessor) valuation of its property located at 3800 Vance Road in Holly Hill, South Carolina, identified as TMS #298-00-01-004.000, for the 2003 tax year. In this matter, the Assessor contends that Petitioner failed to file its objection to the assessed value of the property in question within the time required by law. Specifically, the Assessor asserts that, under S.C. Code Ann. §§ 12-60-2510(A)(3) (Supp. 2004) and 12-60-2520(A) (2000), Petitioner was required to file its objection to the 2003 assessment of its property by August 21, 2003 (i.e., ninety days after the Assessor mailed notice of the assessment), but that Petitioner did not file its objection until January 13, 2004. As this contention raises a jurisdictional question that must be decided by this tribunal before proceeding to a hearing on the merits of this case, a motions hearing on whether Petitioner timely filed its objection to the 2003 assessment of the property at issue was held on November 30, 2004, at the South Carolina Administrative Law Court (ALC) in Columbia, South Carolina. See Bridges v. Wyandotte Worsted Co., 243 S.C. 1, 8, 132 S.E.2d 18, 21 (1962) (“[E]very court has the power and duty to determine whether or not it has jurisdiction of a cause presented to it for determination . . . .”), overruled in part on other grounds by Sabb v. S.C. State Univ., 350 S.C. 416, 567 S.E.2d 231 (2002); Lake v. Reeder Constr. Co., 330 S.C. 242, 248, 498 S.E.2d 650, 653 (Ct. App. 1998) (noting that the “lack of subject matter jurisdiction can be raised at any time, can be raised for the first time on appeal, and can be raised sua sponte by the court”). Based upon the evidence and arguments presented at that hearing, I find that this case must be dismissed because of Petitioner’s failure to timely file its objection to the 2003 assessment of its property.

FACTUAL BACKGROUND

On May 23, 2003, the Orangeburg County Assessor’s Office mailed notice of the assessed value of the property at issue for tax year 2003 to Petitioner T.D. Powell, LLC, at 3800 Vance Road, Holly Hill, South Carolina 29059. This address was the address provided as Petitioner’s address (“Grantee’s Address”) on the 2002 deed reflecting the sale of the property; it is also the street address for the property. See Resp’t Ex. #1. However, as there was no mail receptacle at the property, the notice was returned to the Assessor’s Office. Subsequent investigation by the Assessor’s Office did not reveal any other mailing addresses for Petitioner. The address on file with the South Carolina Secretary of State for Petitioner’s registered agent is the property’s address at 3800 Vance Road, and Petitioner does not have a listing in the applicable telephone directory, does not have any motor vehicles registered in its name, and does not have an address listed with the Orangeburg County Treasurer. Further, at the time the Assessor was mailing notices of assessment, Petitioner had not notified the Assessor’s Office of any mailing address other than the property’s address. After learning of the 2003 assessment for the property online, T.D. Powell, the owner of Petitioner T.D. Powell, LLC, contacted the Assessor by telephone regarding the assessment in December 2003 and filed a challenge to the assessment with the Assessor on January 13, 2004. The Assessor and the Orangeburg County Board of Assessment Appeals denied Petitioner’s challenge as untimely. Petitioner now seeks review of these denials before this tribunal.

DISCUSSION

In the instant matter, Petitioner does not dispute that it did not file its challenge to the 2003 assessment of its property within ninety days of the date on which the Assessor mailed notice of the assessment to the business. Rather, it contends that the Assessor failed to provide it with proper notice of the assessment in May 2003, as the notice was mailed to address of the subject property, where Petitioner does not receive mail, instead of the personal post office box of its owner, T.D. Powell. Therefore, Petitioner claims that, as the May mailing did not constitute proper notice, its objection to the assessment, filed within thirty days of its learning of the assessment online, was timely filed. The Assessor argues that it took those efforts required by law to inform a corporate property owner of the assessment of its property, and thus provided adequate notice of the assessment of the property to Petitioner in May 2003, such that its objection filed in January 2004 must be regarded as untimely. For the reasons set out below, I find that the Assessor’s dismissal of Petitioner’s objection as untimely must be sustained.

The resolution of this matter turns upon S.C. Code Ann. § 12-60-2510 (2000 & Supp. 2004), which governs the issuance of property tax assessment notices by county assessors and the filing of objections to those assessments by taxpayers. Specifically, Section 12-60-2510(A)(2) (Supp. 2004) sets forth an assessor’s responsibilities in attempting to serve property tax assessment notices:

The notice must be served upon the taxpayer personally or by mailing it to the taxpayer at his last known place of residence which may be determined from the most recent listing in the applicable telephone directory, the Department of Motor Vehicle’s motor vehicle registration list, county treasurer’s records, or official notice from the property taxpayer.

Id. The taxpayer then has ninety days “after the assessor mails the property tax assessment notice” to give the assessor written notice of any objection to the assessment. S.C. Code Ann. § 12-60-2510(A)(3) (Supp. 2004); see also S.C. Code Ann. § 12-60-2520(A) (2000) (“A property taxpayer may object to a property tax assessment made by a county assessor by requesting in writing to meet with the assessor within the time limits provided in Section 12-60-2510.”).

In the case at hand, the Assessor followed the notice requirements of Section 12-60-2510(A)(2). While much of Section 12-60-2510(A)(2) contemplates service of notice upon an individual, see id. (referring to service “upon the taxpayer personally or by mailing it to the taxpayer at his last known place of residence”) (emphasis added), the Assessor adhered to the requirements of this section as reasonably adapted to service upon a corporate entity like Petitioner, which is a limited liability company, not an individual. The Assessor mailed notice of the assessment to the business address provided for Petitioner on the deed for the subject property, which is also the address listed with the Secretary of State as the address for Petitioner’s registered agent. And, when that address was found to be invalid, the Assessor consulted, without success, the telephone directories in Orangeburg County, the Department of Motor Vehicles, and the Orangeburg County Treasurer to find another address for Petitioner. In short, in these efforts to ascertain a valid mailing address for Petitioner, the Assessor exercised the sort of due diligence to find the correct address of a property owner as required in other circumstances in which tax notices are mailed. See, e.g., Benton v. Logan, 323 S.C. 338, 474 S.E.2d 446 (Ct. App. 1996) (finding that a treasurer failed to exercise due diligence to find the “best address” for a property owner with delinquent taxes, as required by S.C. Code Ann. § 12-51-120 (Supp. 2004), because he did not seek to discover the property owner’s correct address after an initial notice was returned with the notation that a forwarding order had expired). Moreover, I do not find that Section 12-60-2510(A)(2) or any standard of due diligence required the Assessor to essentially pierce the corporate veil of Petitioner’s status as a limited liability company and search for a mailing address for Petitioner’s owner or owners in their individual capacities.

Here, the Assessor complied with the service of notice requirements of Section 12-60-2510(A)(2) and acted with due diligence in attempting to serve notice of the 2003 assessment of the property in question upon Petitioner. Therefore, pursuant to Section 12-60-2510(A)(3), Petitioner had ninety days from the date on which the Assessor mailed notice of the assessment to file an objection to the assessment. However, Petitioner did not file his objection to the assessment until some eight months after the notice of the assessment was mailed. Accordingly,

IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that the Assessor’s denial of Petitioner’s objection to the assessed value of the property in question for tax year 2003 is SUSTAINED.

AND IT IS SO ORDERED.

______________________________

JOHN D. GEATHERS

Administrative Law Judge

January 10, 2005

Columbia, South Carolina