Court Opinion

ID: 9551706
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 18:57:48.288428+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:24:25.682366
License: Public Domain

Ott, J.
(concurring in part and dissenting in part) — I concur in that part of the majority opinion which holds *490that the Tax Commission has the constitutional power to compel uniformity of taxation within the territorial limits of Snohomish County and that
There can be no doubt that the Tax Commission is correct in its contention that the tax ratio employed by the assessor is not uniform throughout Snohomish County; since, the county is the authority levying the tax and not the various school districts as individual taxing units. The Tax Commission properly ordered compliance with the constitutional standard required by the Fourteenth Amendment.
I disagree with the holding of the majority that the State Tax Commission’s order is void because it did not order the assessments of real property in Snohomish County to be increased to “fifty per centum of the true and fair value” as provided by the seventeenth amendment to the state constitution:
(1) In this appeal the legal issue presented was the single issue “Can the State Tax Commission order uniformity in the admitted 20 percent valuation ratio in a part of Snohomish County and the 25 percent valuation ratio in the remaining part of the county.” The majority, in my opinion, properly ordered compliance with the fourteenth amendment to the state constitution.
(2) The issue of who has the power or authority to require the County Assessor of Snohomish County, and all the other county assessors in the state, to assess property at 50 per cent of its true and fair market value was not raised by the petitioners or respondents, either in their printed briefs or in oral argument before this court. The purported issue of the 50 per cent valuation for taxation purposes is therefore not before us in this appeal and should not be summarily decided.
(3) If assessors are to be ordered by this court to assess property for taxation purposes at 50 per cent of its fair market value, such an order should be predicated upon a proper appeal in which that issue is regularly presented for judicial determination. The questioned clause in our constitution has never been interpreted by this court.
*491(4) As I read the majority opinion, the court holds the 50 per cent assessment to be mandatory. Yet since the constitutional provision has existed, no assessor in the state has ever assessed property at 50 per cent of its fair market value. The state legislature throughout the years have construed the provision to be permissive and, in order to equalize the assessments throughout the state, have created the county and state boards of equalization and the State Tax Commission to equalize assessments county-wide and state-wide at a ratio far below 50 per cent of fair market value. This court likewise has in essence construed the section as permissive when it has declared constitutional the creation of these equalization boards and has, in many cases, held legal the county assessors’ assessments.
I conclude that the instant case is not the proper case in which this issue of statewide importance should be summarily adjudicated.
If, in a properly presented case, this section should be adjudicated by this court to be mandatory rather than permissive, every assessor’s office in the state will be thereby affected in the enforcement of the mandate, and all tax rolls will be suspect as to their validity. Such an opinion should expressly provide that the decision shall be prospective and not retroactive, and the prospective effective date should be declared to be a sufficient time in the future to give the assessors statewide an opportunity to make the assessments and prepare their assessment rolls in conformity with this court’s interpretation of the constitutional standard.
In my opinion, that portion of the majority decision which interprets the questioned constitutional clause in the Seventeenth Amendment (which is not properly before this court) should be deleted and that portion which relates to the Fourteenth Amendment should be retained.