Johnson County board to discuss resident’s taxes on a tower that was never built

IOWA CITY - A Johnson County woman is seeking a refund from the county for increased taxes she had been paying after an erroneous assessment of her property listed a cellular tower that has never been built.

The Johnson County Board of Supervisors likely will vote next week on the issue, which has been summed up by those involved as mistakes by both the county and property owner.

'In this case it's taxing someone on a structure that was never built,” Supervisor Janelle Rettig said during a Wednesday work session. 'It happened, it was wrong, and we should fix it.”

Jean Fisher, of Iowa City, said the situation began several years ago, when she entered into an agreement with Verizon Wireless to allow a cellular tower on a portion of her land near 4911 Morse Road.

In 2010, a Johnson County assessor performed a standard assessment of Fisher's property, but mistook an existing monopole tower roughly two miles from Fisher's site as the new Verizon tower and the chunk of property was changed from agricultural to commercial, thus increasing the property tax payments for both Fisher and Verizon Wireless.

Fisher's tax bill increased by roughly $1,600 a year as a result and the erroneous assessment cost Fisher roughly $5,000 total, according to county documents.

'I'm not going to go away,” Fisher said. 'The mistake that got made should not be on my dime.”

Verizon Wireless, which has lost roughly $25,000 since the assessment was made, has not contacted the county about the increased taxes.

County Assessor Bill Greazel said the erroneous assessment, which was made by a new county employee, was an honest mistake. He added that assessing properties is not an exact science and assessments are rarely 100 percent accurate.

That said, Greazel noted that assessing a tower that doesn't exist is 'very unusual.”

Greazel said there is a process in place for taxpayers to address discrepancies within a set time frame after assessments are received. Fisher failed to do so.

'Her assessment went up by 30 percent and she never questioned it. It was an honest mistake,” Greazel said. 'There is an administrative process to take care of these things, if you don't take care of it, that's kind of on you.”

Fisher said she thought her taxes were based on the land's zoning, not the actual use, so she originally thought nothing of the tax increase. It wasn't until an acquaintance notified her last year that she shouldn't be paying taxes on the nonexistent tower that she realized the error.

Fisher has since contacted a number of county officials, but all the county Board of Review could do within its power was change the value retroactively for the 2013 assessment, which has since taken place. Fisher wants a refund of all the extra taxes she paid, back to 2011.

'My issue is from then and that day forward, I began to go from one place to the next and the next in order to ask for my money back,” Fisher said. 'I want my money back.”

To add insult to injury, Fisher will not receive rent payments from Verizon for the tower - money she planned to put into a college fund for her children - until it is built.

An official vote by the board will not take place until next week and Supervisors Mike Carberry and Rod Sullivan have not indicated how they feel on the matter.

Supervisor Pat Harney appeared to lean in favor of Fisher.

'I don't think two wrongs make a right here, to me it should have never been taxed in the way that it was,” he said.

Supervisor Terrence Neuzil said he was hesitant to contradict the county assessor's office.

'I am comfortable with the assessor's role in this case,” Neuzil said.