Opinion ID: 1179468
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: 49 U.S.C. SECTION 1513(d)

Text: 49 U.S.C. section 1513(d) provides, in part: (1) The following acts unreasonably burden and discriminate against interstate commerce and a State, subdivision of a State, or authority acting for a State or subdivision of a State may not do any of them: (A) assess air carrier transportation property at a value that has a higher ratio to the true market value of the air carrier transportation property than the ratio that the assessed value of other commercial and industrial property of the same type in the same assessment jurisdiction has to the true market value of the other commercial and industrial property;      (2) In this subsection (A) `Assessment' means valuation for a property tax levied by a taxing district;      (C) `air carrier transportation property' means property    owned or used by an air carrier providing air transportation; (D) `commercial and industrial property' means property, other than transportation property and land used primarily for agricultural purposes or timber growing, devoted to a commercial or industrial use and subject to a property tax levy[.] (Emphasis added.) Subsection (d)(1)(A) prohibits discriminatory taxation of air carrier transportation property by requiring states to assess such property at a ratio to true market value that does not exceed the ratio of assessed value to true market value for other commercial and industrial property. In other words, the assessment ratio for airline property must not be higher than the assessment ratio for other similar property. The process by which tax assessing authorities ensure that the former does not exceed the latter is referred to as equalization. As noted, the parties stipulated before the Tax Court that the department assessed the airlines' property at 100 percent of its true market value. The equalization issue in this case, therefore, involves the determination of the assessment ratio for the other commercial and industrial property located in the county for the 1993-94 tax year, which we refer to in this opinion as the comparison class. [8] Oregon law requires that non-exempt personal property be assessed at 100 percent of its true market value. ORS 308.232 and 308.250(1). [9] In accordance with that statutory mandate, the assessment ratio for the comparison class should be 100 percent, the equivalent of the airlines' assessment ratio. The airlines contend, however, that the assessment practices followed by both the county and the department resulted in the substantial undervaluation of property in the comparison class. The airlines further argue that, according to their evidence, the comparison class was assessed at only 75.5 percent of its true market value. The department responds that the assessment ratio for the comparison class was between 97.7 and 100.65 percent. We address the issues presented by those competing contentions below.