Fight against new values vowed

Hanover Township property owner Vic Kopko said he will definitely sue if commissioners don’t do something to halt the reassessment.

Kopko said he and other property owners from throughout the county have already pledged legal fees to fight the reassessment, and he’s confident he will receive more if he publicly requests donations.

“We already have about $70,000 committed to getting this thing stopped,” Kopko said.

“We are going to give the commissioners the opportunity to do the right thing,” he said.

Commissioners voted last week to seek additional input on the reassessment, but none of the three has committed to delaying or cancelling the project. Commissioners instructed property owners to proceed as planned and meet all appeal deadlines.

Kopko said the suit would be handled by Wilkes-Barre attorneys Bruce Phillips and John Rodgers.

“We feel we have a tremendously good legal basis. There are a host of legal and fairness issues,” Kopko said.

He said it wouldn’t technically be a class-action suit, but rather a suit in which property owners team up to challenge the countywide project.

“Not everybody has the same issue, but there are multiple issues that could attack the entire validity of the way the county was reassessed,” Phillips said. “Basically we’re looking at two problems – the way they did it and the way people have to redress appeals.”

Phillips recently publicly stated his concern that the county was refusing to allow property owners to continue formal appeals if they didn’t have time to obtain certified appraisals.

Phillips said a county official has since contacted him to say that continuances would be permitted, but he has not heard of any instances where continuances were granted.

Phillips said values are also “all over the place,” and he questions whether the data used to formulate the values are “stale.”

Representatives of the reassessment company, 21st Century Appraisals Inc., have said fresh sales data were factored into formulas since the reassessment was postponed.

Kopko said he’s had strangers appear at his door and call him with concerns about the reassessment.

“I’ve had people crying and shaking, people who say they can’t eat or sleep,” he said.

Kopko tried to sell his home in Countrywood Estates more than a year ago for $349,000, and received one offer of $274,000.

21st Century has valued the property at $392,300, which will raise his taxes from $4,800 to $9,000.

He said he went through the informal review and provided appraisal evidence that the square footage was off by 200 square feet, using 21st Century’s specified exterior measurements, but the error was not corrected.

“Our home is relatively new, and I’ve been paying my fair share, and now they’re going to whack us over the head again?” Kopko said. “Somebody has to stand up for what’s right.”

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Area man: Suit would be filed before values certified; $70K committed for potential suit.

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