Court Opinion

ID: 9536606
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 07:03:20.668383+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:54:50.847120
License: Public Domain

ELLETT, Justice
(dissenting) :
I dissent.
The Tax Commission ordered an informal hearing on these matters, but the petitioner failed to attend. The petitioner makes no claim that the Code of Administrative Procedure is defective. It simply wants this court to remand the matters and order the Tax Commission to hold that the property is taxable.
After failing to attend the informal hearing, the petitioner requested the Tax Commission to hold a formal hearing. This was refused, and the petition to this court followed.
There is no record of facts before us, and the unrefuted allegations in petitioner’s brief are not any evidence upon which we could justify ordering the Tax Commission to hold the property taxable.
I think the Tax Commission was justified in refusing to hold a formal hearing. If it must hold such a hearing on every appeal, it could not possibly perform its work. A great number of matters appealed from local boards to the Tax Commission can be and are settled at an informal hearing. Such a hearing is in the nature of a pretrial conference before the courts, where facts are agreed upon and issues of law are settled. A party who would not attend a pretrial conference would be in a poor position to complain of rulings made by the court which were based upon matters not in dispute at the conference. To me it seems that one who appeals to the Tax Commission from the local board must attend the informal hearing to see if there are any genuine issues to be determined, and if he fails to do that, he is in no position to ask for a formal hearing.
^1 think the petition should be dismissed and the ruling of the Tax Commission affirmed.
HENRIOD, C. J., concurs in the views expressed in the dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice ELLETT.