TRAVIS COUNTY, Texas — The Travis County Appraisal Review Board and Chief Appraiser Marya Crigler are being sued under accusations that they unfairly denied hearings for more than 150 property owners, according to court documents dated Oct. 8.
The lawsuit was filed by two companies representing property owners, Texas Protax Austin Inc. and Five Stone Tax Advisers LLC, in addition to 113 residential and 46 commercial property owners.
According to the suit, the plaintiffs claim that Crigler overbooked hearings on the 2018 protests to keep taxpayers from having the representation they wanted in what they called a "war on tax agents."
The 24-page lawsuit claims that Dave Brown, an agent with Protax, obtained a reduced value for commercial clients in more than 76 percent of the hearings he was involved in this year. Five Stones claims that its agents received reductions for residential clients in more than 85 percent of the hearings.
The suit also claims that Crigler and her chief deputy, Lonnie Hendry, targeted these companies by making it impossible for tax agents to appear at their hearings. It even claims that, in one case, they assigned an agent all 517 of his hearings in just three days on five review board panels simultaneously.
Additionally, the defendants are accused of permitting other tax agents to reschedule and hold informal hearings, while Five Stone and Protax were not. The suit claims that the board violated the Texas Open Meetings Act by not giving sufficient notice that the board was considering the dismissal of protests printed in meeting agendas.
In the suit, the plaintiffs ask a judge to require that their 2018 appraisal protests receive a fair hearing and declare any dismissals that occurred as a result of an Open Meetings Act violation void. They also ask that Crigler and her employees become prohibited from overstepping their authority through actions such as assigning protests in a non-random method and dismissing protests without a hearing.
"These Travis officials showed that, unless the Tax Code is changed so that taxpayers can enforce their right in court to a fair hearing to protest tax appraisals, taxpayers will not get fair treatment from these officials," said Bill Aleshire, an attorney and former county judge who filed the lawsuit. "Like Austin City officials have done from time to time, these Travis appraisal district officials have called in an airstrike on themselves from the Legislature. This court battle we start today is just the first step in ensuring that Travis County taxpayers are treated fairly by the appraisal district."
KVUE reached out to the Travis County Appraisal Review Board on Tuesday. They said they have no comment at this time.
See the full lawsuit below:
Travis County Appraisal Review Board Suit by kvuenews on Scribd