Court Opinion

ID: 9845260
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 03:17:56.821126+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:15:57.687409
License: Public Domain

BARNES, Judge,
dissenting.
Because the statement in OCGA § 6-3-21 “that the underlying fee interest in such property which remains vested in the county, municipality, or other political subdivision shall be deemed to be used for public, governmental, and municipal purposes” controls the disposition of this appeal, I must respectfully dissent. In my opinion this language obviates the need to further analyze whether the City’s land was held for public purposes as was done in Clayton County Bd. of Tax Assessors v. City of Atlanta, 164 Ga. App. 864 (298 SE2d 544) (1982) (“Clayton County”).
Our Supreme Court made clear in Roberts v. Eastern Air Lines, 257 Ga. 273, 275 (357 SE2d 585) (1987), that the 1983 amendment to OCGA § 6-3-21 was a response to Clayton County. The amendment, in addition to making certain that private leaseholds are taxable by the host government, also added the language emphasized above. Thus, the statement “shall be deemed to be used for public, governmental, and municipal purposes” constitutes a legislative determination that the underlying fee interest is for public purposes in all circumstances.
In 1982 when this court decided Clayton County, the Code section that is now codified at OCGA § 6-3-21 merely stated that “[a]ny lands acquired, owned, leased, controlled, or occupied by counties, municipalities, or other political subdivisions for the purpose or purposes enumerated in Code Section 6-3-20 shall be and are declared to be acquired, owned, leased, controlled, or occupied for *89public, governmental, and municipal purposes.” Then, in 1983, this Code section was amended to add
provided, however, that with respect to facilities located on such lands, which are leased to, controlled, or occupied by private parties, the interests created in such private parties, for the purpose of ad valorem taxation only, are declared not to be used for public, governmental, or municipal purposes and said resulting interests, regardless of the extent of such interest, whether possessory or an estate in land, are subject to ad valorem taxation; provided, further, that the underlying fee interest in such property which remains vested in the county, municipality, or other political subdivision shall be deemed to be used for public, governmental, and municipal purposes.
Ga. L. 1983, p. 647. This amendment accomplished two things: First, it made all leases to private parties subject to taxation,4 regardless of whether a leasehold or a term of years and whether the leases were for governmental purposes, and, second, it “deemed” all remaining vested underlying governmental interests to be used for “public, governmental, and municipal purposes.” Therefore, the host government would be authorized to tax all private leases, but could not tax the other government’s remaining interest. This interpretation is reinforced by the 1985 amendmentto OCGA§ 6-3-21 which added the statement “which lands are located outside of the territorial limits of the political subdivision that leases such lands” and also added the last sentence to what currently comprises the Code section:
The municipality’s interest in lands and the facilities located thereon located inside the territorial limits of a municipality which are owned by that municipality for the purposes enumerated in Code Section 6-3-20, are declared to be used for public, governmental, or municipal purposes and are not subject to ad valorem taxation.
Ga. L. 1985, p. 1649, § 1. The preamble to this law states that the Code section was amended to “provide that lands owned by a municipality for purposes of Code Section 6-3-20, which lands are located inside the territorial limits of the municipality, when leased to private parties are declared to be used for public purposes. . . .” With this *90amendment, the General Assembly treated all private airport leases and remaining governmental fee interests in the same manner.
Decided December 1, 2004
Reconsideration denied December 16, 2004
Smith, Gambrell & Russell, Edward K. Smith, for appellant.
Hancock & Palmer, Jack R. Hancock, Brian R. Dempsey, for appellee.
In construing the present OCGA § 6-3-21 we are obliged to “look diligently for the intention of the General Assembly, keeping in view at all times the old law, the evil, and the remedy.” OCGA § 1-3-1 (a). In my opinion, the remedy the General Assembly chose to respond to Clayton County was twofold: tax the private leaseholders’ interests regardless of the nature of the interest and purpose of the lease, and relieve the government entity from all taxation by the host government. The second division of Clayton County clearly considered whether the City’s interest in the property could be taxed, and the General Assembly responded by rejecting such an analysis in favor of a broad policy of not taxing the remaining governmental interest in the land. Further, even though all the amendments and current Code section contain the reference to OCGA § 6-3-20, this reference is intended to differentiate lands acquired for airports from lands acquired for other purposes and not to mean that the leases should be examined to ascertain whether they were for a governmental or public purpose. Regardless of the means to which any particular parcel of Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport might be employed, one cannot conclude reasonably that the land was not acquired and is currently used for anything other than an airport.
Under these circumstances, I cannot agree with the majority’s determination that the City of Atlanta’s remaining interest was subject to taxation by Clayton County. Therefore, I must respectfully dissent.

 The preamble to Ga. L. 1983, p. 647, states that the amendment was “to provide that lands leased by counties, municipalities, or other political subdivisions to private parties are declared not to be leased for public purposes... .”