Opinion ID: 1494643
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Rieck Ice Cream Company Appeal

Text: In Rieck Ice Cream Company Appeal, 417 Pa., supra, and in Heinz Company v. Board of Property Assessment, the appeal was from the assessment of a building on property situate in Pittsburgh. The majority Opinion in each of these cases completely nullifies the statute and the ordinance  the statute [] which, we repeat, specifically applies and mandates a separate assessment and (the Ordinance specifically applies and mandates) a different millage for land and for buildings  by (1) ignoring and voiding the Ordinance and (2) by holding that that statute is applicable only to assessors and not to a Court of Common Pleas which reviews an assessment de novo on appeal. In other words, the majority Opinion in Rieck and Heinz and McKnight expressly, and the majority Opinion in several of these companion cases impliedly, hold that there is one rule before the Board of Assessment for determining the value and assessment of a property and an entirely different rule when exactly the same question is presented on appeal de novo to the Court of Common Pleas. Such a construction was never the intention of the Legislature; and it flies in the teeth of the statute and is unsupportable. Furthermore, in Rieck, the majority Opinion holds that evidence of the prior assessment was neither res adjudicata nor one of the factors which the Board or the Court could consider. Of course it was not res adjudicata; equally certain, it was admissible in evidence as a factor to be considered in the proper valuation and assessment for the triennial period involved in the Rieck case. Moreover, in Rieck (and similarly in McKnight and Pittsburgh Miracle Mile ) the majority Opinion says: The thing from which the property owner appeals and therefore the concern before the court, is the total assessment of the property as a unit. If this is correct, it completely ignores and is necessarily contrary to the majority Opinion in the companion case of Morris v. Board of Property Assessment, 417 Pa. 192, 209 A. 2d 407. I likewise disagree with the statements in Rieck and in several of the majority Opinions filed simultaneously herewith, that real estate must be valued and assessed as an indivisible unit or class. Language can be found in several prior cases to refute this principle. It therefore seems to me erroneous to say that real estate is one indivisible class and cannot be divided into one or more kinds or classes of real estate, i.e., land and buildings. Moreover, this theory would require the Court to hold that the Acts supra which require a separate assessment and separate tax for land and for buildings, are Unconstitutional.