Board of Aldermen 11-13-2018 Page 15
MOTION BY ALDERMAN DOWD TO ACCEPT THE FIRST READING OF R-18-092, ASSIGN IT TO
THE BUDGET REVIEW COMMITTEE AND THAT A PUBLIC HEARING BE SCHEDULED FOR
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 26, 2018, AT 7:00 PM IN THE ALDERMANIC CHAMBER
NEW BUSINESS — ORDINANCES
O-18-029
Endorsers: Alderman-at-Large Michael B. O’Brien, Sr.
Alderman-at-Large Lori Wilshire
Alderman Patricia Klee
Alderman Richard A. Dowd
Alderman Ken Gidge
Alderman Linda Harriott-Gathright
Alderman-at-Large Brandon Michael Laws
Alderman Tom Lopez
Alderman June M. Caron
Alderwoman-at-Large Shoshanna Kelly
Alderwoman Mary Ann Melizzi-Golja
Alderman-at-Large David C. Tencza
Alderman Jan Schmidt
INCREASING THE EXEMPTION AMOUNT FOR THE BLIND, ELDERLY, AND DISABLED TAX
EXEMPTIONS BY 25% TOTAL OVER THE NEXT TWO YEARS
Given its first reading; assigned to the PERSONNEL/ADMINISTRATIVE AFFAIRS COMMITTEE by
President Wilshire
PERIOD FOR GENERAL PUBLIC COMMENT
Lori Ortolano, 41 Berkeley Street. Nice to see you all. | wanted to speak to the comments that the
Mayor made regarding the report that John Griffin put together and | appreciate him providing this to all
of us. | had the chance to talk to Chuck Reese up at DRA and the document here provided does show
out of the properties looked at, all of the properties 3 were permitted. The one thing that Chuck made
clear to me is their sample is not very statistically significant. They pool together a lot of qualities that
they are looking at into a single pull on permits.
When | asked “why” he said, “because are so short staffed, we just don’t have the manpower to send
around town to town to do samples that are more significant”. So we can pat ourselves on the back
because we have a great score, but when we are looking at permitted data like | am looking at, | see 3
permits here in the data pulled and that isn’t very statistically significant for permit issues. | think if | had
come to you and said | found 3 permits looking at 100 that weren’t correct and | was concluding that we
had a problem, you would all tell me to take a hike because it just wasn’t enough data. | looked at 100
and found many more issues and to let you know last week | pulled another 100 and | spent part of the
weekend reviewing those and the data is equally concerning. So | am trying to make certain that | have
a sample that is statistically significant and that is why in fact | went back and looked at sales data to
the tune of 100 points. That is just a little food for thought there.
When it comes to these assessments and the tax bills that just went out and the concerns that we have,
one of the concerns that | carry is that the reaction of management within City Hall isn’t what | expect
for what we see with these new assessments. | think from the beginning when | saw KRT’s data and |
saw so many properties that went up 40%, 50%, 60% or 100%, | felt outraged. | mean my gut reaction
was this is just not right. I’ve heard people speak, administrators, leaders with “you know the people
who experienced these hikes they are just not going to be happy”. | think we should all be unhappy with
that data because that is part of the problem. Why has there been growth over the last 5 years on the
order of 25%, we assessed in 2013 and now we have properties that are 100% out. What is creating
