Court Opinion

ID: 9659828
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 21:55:40.722583+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:14:11.914606
License: Public Domain

HECHT, Justice,
dissenting.
I dissent. Once again the Court, unassisted by precedent or logic, rewrites a statute to its own liking. Taxpayers with the temerity to protest the valuation of their property by trying to follow the statutory rules, without the benefit and expense of expert legal counsel, are in for a cruel surprise. Only the very shrewd are likely to suspect that a statute which says that a taxpayer is entitled to an administrative hearing tacitly mandates that the taxpayer attend that hearing or give up the right to judicial review of the protested property valuation. To play so sharply with the rules governing tax protests is unfair and unjust.
The scant record in this case presents a rather skeletal set of facts. The Webb County Appraisal District valued the real property involved in this case at $4,648,638 for 1987. New Laredo Hotel, Inc. bought the property on June 2, 1987, for $3,000,-000. On June 12, the Hotel’s agent, who was not an attorney, wrote to the District’s Chief Appraiser protesting the excessive valuation. Enclosed with the protest was an unsworn copy of a closing statement substantiating the Hotel’s purchase of the property for $3,000,000. The District received the Hotel’s timely protest and closing statement on June 15, and the same day mailed a notice that the protest would be heard by the Appraisal Review Board on June 30. The notice stated curtly, “You will be allowed 15 minutes at this hearing to present any evidence relevant to the issue being appealed....” The Hotel’s agent received the notice of hearing on June 19, eleven days before the date set for the hearing. The Hotel’s agent contacted the District and requested that the hearing be rescheduled because of conflicting hearings already scheduled by other taxing authorities, but the District refused to reschedule the hearing. Because the agent was required to attend other hearings scheduled at the same time, and because he erroneously believed that he was entitled to fifteen days’ actual notice of the hearing,1 he did not attend the hearing in Webb County. The Appraisal Review Board denied the Hotel’s protest based solely upon the Hotel’s failure to appear at the hearing. *956The Hotel petitioned the district court for review of the Board’s ruling. The district court granted the District’s motion to dismiss the action for want of jurisdiction. The court of appeals reversed the judgment of the district court and remanded the case for consideration of the merits.
The Court holds that because the Hotel failed to appear at the hearing on its protest of the valuation of its property, it is prohibited from obtaining judicial review of that valuation.2 The Court appears to rest its holding on two bases, the pertinent statutory language, and the general rule that administrative remedies must be exhausted before judicial review is available. Neither supports the Court’s decision.
The Court acknowledges that the determinative statutory provision is section 41.-45(b) of the Texas Tax Code, which states in pertinent part:
The property owner ... is entitled to an opportunity to appear to offer evidence or argument. The property owner may offer his evidence or argument by affidavit without personally appearing....
(Emphasis added.) Rather plainly, this language extends a right or privilege to taxpayers without imposing any obligation that it be exercised. This is even more apparent when the quoted language is compared with section 41.45(c), only a few lines down, which states: “The chief appraiser shall appear at each protest hearing....” (Emphasis added.)
The Court rewrites section 41.45(b) to state:
The property owner ... must appear to offer evidence or argument, or offer his evidence or argument by affidavit without personally appearing.
This is not merely a clarification of some ambiguous language; it is a complete change in the meaning of the provision.
The sole justification the Court offers for its revisionist interpretation of this statute is that “may” can sometimes mean “shall”. The rather conspicuous deficit in the Court’s logic is that changing the only “may” in the pertinent language of section 41.45(b) to “shall” would make an affidavit necessary but not an appearance. The al-chemic challenge facing the Court is not turning “may” into “shall”, but turning “is entitled to an opportunity to appear” into “must appear”. The Court offers no authority for such an abuse of plain language, and I know of none.
The Court concludes “that taxpayers contesting property valuation must appear, either personally, by representative, or by affidavit, at the protest hearing....” At 955. This statement is a blatant amendment of section 41.66(c) of the Tax Code which states: “A property owner who is entitled as provided by this chapter to appear at a hearing may appear by himself or by his agent.” The Court changes “may” to “must” and then adds, before the period, the words, “or by affidavit”. Again, the Court has not merely sought to explain the real meaning of obscure words; it has unabashedly changed and added words to effect the meaning the Court feels the statute should have.
The Court alludes to the principle that available administrative remedies are to be exhausted before recourse may be had to judicial review of an agency decision. Without analyzing whether and how this complex and not at all well-settled rule may apply in this case,3 the Court simply concludes that mandating the taxpayer’s appearance at a protest hearing is necessary to prevent “the emasculation of the administrative hearing process.” At 955. The Court reasons that without the taxpayer’s appearance at such a hearing, the taxing agency is denied the opportunity to resolve the protest prior to judicial review. The fallacy in the Court’s reasoning is that its holding in this case does not prevent the problem it seeks to avoid. The Court does not require the taxpayer to proffer to the Appraisal Review Board all his evidence in *957support of his protest. Indeed, the taxpayer need not say anything at all in support of his position.4 The Court would not even require him to appear personally, but recognizes that the statute allows a taxpayer to appear through an agent. All the Court has mandated as a prerequisite to judicial review is an appearance by the taxpayer at the protest hearing.
I find the policy which seems to motivate the Court hard to grasp. If a taxpayer attends a hearing on his protest, says nothing and leaves, he is entitled to judicial review of the Board’s decision. Even if he sends an agent on his behalf who knows nothing of the substance of the protest, he is still entitled to judicial review. But if he does not attend the hearing, regardless of the reason (short notice, conflicting hearings by other taxing authorities, refusal of the Board to reschedule), he is cut off from judicial review. If he sends the Board a verified closing statement showing a recent sale of the subject property, but does not appear at the hearing, he may appeal the Board’s adverse ruling to the district court. If he sends an unverified copy of the same document, he cannot appeal. If there is some consistent rationale underlying all this, I fail to see it. Surely, the Court has hardly improved upon the statutory requirements for judicial review.
The Court’s decision today creates a trap for unwary taxpayers and contributes to the expense a prudent citizen must bear to assert his rights. Although the Court has little difficulty in arriving at its conclusion, I doubt seriously whether a taxpayer who tries to understand what is required of him to protest an excessive valuation of his property without costing himself more in the process than he is likely to save will ever see in the language of the statute the requirement the Court imposes today. If he does not subscribe to and study the Court’s opinions, he had better hire someone who does to represent him.
I would hold that the district court has jurisdiction to review the decision of the Webb County Appraisal Review Board, and would therefore affirm the judgment of the court of appeals. Accordingly, I dissent.
PHILLIPS, C.J., joins in this dissenting opinion.

. Section 41.46 of the Texas Tax Code requires the Appraisal Review Board to “deliver" written notice of the date, time and place of the hearing on the protest to the property owner not later than the fifteenth day before the date of hearing. However, section 1.07 of the code permits such notices to be sent by first class mail and states that they are “delivered” when deposited in the mail.

. This is the only issue raised in this Court. The District does not contend that the Hotel failed to comply with any other procedural requirements for judicial review, and the Hotel does not argue that it was entitled to a rescheduling of the protest hearing.

. See, generally, e.g., K. Davis, Administrative Law Treatise ch. 26, at 413-481 (1983).

. This is consistent with the taxpayer’s right to judicial review by trial de novo, as provided by section 42.23(a) of the Tax Code.