McGinnis v. Northwest Independent School District, 15739

• Decision Date: 21 September 1956
• Docket Number: No. 15739,15739
• Parties: William McGINNLS et al., Appellants, v. NORTHWEST INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT et al., Appellees.
• Court: Texas Court of Appeals

Page 154

294 S.W.2d 154

William McGINNLS et al., Appellants, v. NORTHWEST INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT et al., Appellees.

No. 15739.

Court of Civil Appeals of Texas, Fort Worth.

Sept. 21, 1956.

Rehearing Denied Oct. 19, 1956.

Martin & Moore and Elvin E. Tackett, Fort Worth, for appellants.

Fred H. Minor and John L. Sullivan, Denton, for appellees.

MASSEY, Chief Justice.

From a judgment denying equitable injunctive relief from the collection of school taxes, individual property owners seeking the relief appealed.

Judgment affirmed.

Prior to 1955, the taxes assessed in behalf of the Northwest Independent School District were assessed by the tax assessors of the three counties embraced within the District. These counties were Denton, Wise and Tarrant. A part of each of these three counties were, in the aggregate, the Northwest Independent School District. In 1955, the District appointed its own tax assessor and employed a tax expert who proceeded to identify and appraise the property within the District for tax purposes. This matter was put on cards and turned over to the School Board, which in turn delivered them to the tax assessor. The tax assessor saw fit to make only a very few changes in the cards prior to making her assessment of the property in the District. The tax assessor, a woman, mailed notices to all taxpayers of the 1955 tax values for assessment purposes. The assessed values were based upon 60% of the actual values for which the tax expert had appraised property within the District. In most instances, such values were greatly in excess of the values which had been used by the Denton, Wise and Tarrant County tax assessors in previous years. The disparity in values was typical of any instance where any tax unit physically reevaluates its property subject to taxation.

The District's Board of Equalization sat as directed pursuant to provisions of Vernon's Ann.Civ.St.Tex. Article 7206. The Board received the assessor's records for use and action pursuant to prescribed procedure. As of that time, every assessment made with which we are concerned was an assessment made by the tax assessor for the property owners, since no individual owner had rendered his own property. V.A.T.S. Article 7193, provides that the tax assessor's assessment against the property listed is to be treated as valid and binding upon the property's owner as if the owner had himself listed and valued it. Undoubtedly, that is the case when the assessment is not contended to be void.

Later, at the equalization session of the Board in May, 1955, a large number of the property owners presented themselves. In essence, their concern was upon the newly assessed valuation figures as compared with those formerly used. It is apparent from the record before us that these property owners believed their taxes would be higher than formerly. In view of the unexpectedly large number of property owners who appeared, and, in view of the emotional state existing at the time of their appearance, or stimulated by the events transpiring at the site of the hearing, a great mane events of interest transpired during the days when the Board of Equalization was sitting. Only a few of them will have a bearing upon the proper disposition or the appeal. They will be disregarded except where occasion requires consideration in the disposition of the points on appeal.

Following the conclusion of the Board's duties, the tax assessor made up the tax rolls for the District. Regular procedure resulted in the receipt thereof by the tax collectors of Wise, Denton and Tarrant Counties to serve as a basis for administrative tax collection. At this time a suit for injunctive and other relief was filed by and in behalf of many of the property owners affected-in the form of a class suit. Subsequently, after the various tax collectors had sent out tax statements to all the property owners affected and after some taxes had been paid, these petitioners filed their amended original petition for relief. In the fall of 1955, on this petition, the case was tried in the District Court of Denton County, Texas. All the relief applied for was denied. Following this, many of the individual property owners, who were parties in the trial court seeking individual relief, abandoned further prosecution of the suit. Some of the property owners perfected an appeal however, and all before this court on the appeal are presently seeking individual injunctive relief. The suit, in so far as it sought relief in behalf of any class of persons, was abandoned on appeal.

Each of the three points of error presented is urged with a different set of property owners named as appellants. In other words, one group of property owners seeks reversal of the trial court under point one, an entirely different group seeks reversal under point two, and still another and different group seeks reversal under point three.

Under point two, complaint is made that the trial court erred in refusing to enjoin the collection of taxes assessed against the individuals named because the Board of Equalization failed to 'hear evidence' and to fix tax values 'after hearing the evidence' as contemplated and provided by V.A.T.S., Articles 7211 and 7212. It is contended that in view of the fact that the Board failed in such respects the assessed values arrived at and the taxes assessed based thereupon were arbitrary and void as a matter of law. Under point one, a like contention as to taxes being arbitrary and void was based upon the proposition that since the individual members complaining under the point had, at the equalization hearing, received offers from the Board to 'settle' at figures below those of the tax assessor's renditions, the Board was without authority to revert to the tax assessor's figures upon the property owners' failure to agree and 'settle' for the lower figures proposed.

Both points of error must be overruled.

Article 7211 provides that when a property owner renders his own property and the tax assessor is not satisfied with the owner's rendition the assessor shall himself render the property at the valuation he deems proper. Impliedly, the tax assessor is charged with the duty of attempting to agree with the owner upon a proper rendition, failing which the disagreement is certified to the body charged with the obligation of resolving the dispute. In the present instance, had such a dispute arisen, the proper body to hold a hearing would have been the Board of Equalization. The Board, in such instances, would be obliged to sit in a quasi judicial capacity and determine the dispute.

At such hearing, the proper value would be prima facie established in the property owner's rendition, and, before the Board would be entitled to fix the values any higher, evidence would necessarily be required to overcome the property owner's prima facie case thereby established. Of course, the property owner would...