Meet New Haven's Three-Dollar Outlaw

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Meet New Haven’s Three-Dollar Outlaw

by Allan Appel | May 14, 2010 10:14 am

(27) Comments | Commenting has been closed | E-mail the Author

Posted to: Business/Labor/ Economic Development, City Hall

Alan Appel Photo Duncan Goodall was four cents behind on his taxes. He didn’t know it. But the city was ready to take his property away.

So Goodall, the owner of Koffee? on Audubon Street, learned earlier this month.

His story showed how little it takes to become a tax outlaw in a city strapped for cash—and how frustrating it can be to try to find human beings to settle simple matters in the city bureaucracy. Even trying to pay all your taxes can prove a struggle.

On May 1 Goodall received a tax bill for $3.23—along with a threat from the city to place a lien his property if he didn’t pay up within two weeks.

Five days earlier he had paid what he thought was the last bill, $3.19. Apparently payment had crossed in the mail. Now a dangerous four-cent gap—representing newly placed interest—existed.

During an interview at Koffee? this week, Goodall likened the stamped notice of a threatened lien for less than the cost of a large latte to “taking a sledge hammer to whack a fly on the wall”

These big threats for inadvertent non-payment of pennies in accrued interest on business property tax came at the tail end of a year-and-a-half saga of miscommunication between city tax officials and the owner of the successful Audubon Street hangout.

Eight polite letters on Goodall’s part had resulted in a threat to take his property, and for a tax deficiency of under a nickel.

Goodall’s a big tough guy who dislikes how frustrating it often is to do business in New Haven.

The salt in the wound was receiving a lien threat for alleged unpaid pennies on tables, chairs, and equipment at a different coffee shop, Moka on Orange Street—a business Goodall had sold back in December 2008. (The business closed; it’s now has new owners and is called Bru.)

How would Goodall handle the Four Cent Gap?

First, the Tale of the Eight Polite Letters…

In December 2008, Goodall wrote to both the city tax assessor and the tax collector to inform them that Moka was dissolved. In June 2009 he paid $221.48, what he thought was the final business property tax.

Just to be sure he sent two more letters reminding the assessor and collector that Moka no longer existed.

In September 2009 the city sent him his declaration of personal property taxes for 2009 for the business that he’d sold in 2008.

None of these communications was signed. In January of 2010, a real name appeared on the tax bill. A “Ms. Kirby” was requesting $211.94 for 2008, which Goodall had already paid. (That would be Tamara Kirby, a back tax investigator with the Finance Department.)

Goodall wrote back that it had to be a mistake and did not pay. In March “Ms. Kirby” replied it was no mistake, but the January 2010 bill, as he’d paid the 2009 bill previously.

Goodall was becoming, well, upset. How could that be, Goodall wrote back as the business was dissolved and business taxes previously paid?

“Now I’m pissed. So I start screaming to my aldermen, Roland Lemar and Bitsie Clark,” Goodall wrote in a letter, this time not to the tax office but to this reporter.

That prompted a call from Michael Pinto, a city economic development officer who as an attorney also helps out with tax queries. He offered the explanation that had been lacking. The total final business property tax for 2008 was $423.88. Goodall had paid only the first half in June 2009, and he owed the second half, Pinto informed Goodall.

Had “Ms Kirby” explained this to Goodall, much grief and unhappy letter writing could have been averted.

“Every time I get a letter from the city, I’m mad,” Goodall said. He expressed extreme skepticism about the truth of mayoral statements that New Haven is business friendly. “Every interaction is a threat, fine, a bump up in permit fees.”

But the saga was not quite complete. After he paid the second and last installment of $211.94, another bill came, on May 1, for $3.19, which was the accrued interest during all the letter-writing months.

That was the letter with the note threatening lien. In the time it took for the check to get to the city and to process, another five cents of interest had been added, so Goodall’s balance was still outstanding.

His conclusion: “Crazy, crazy, crazy,” and dismay.

This time, he wrote not letters but two notes, if not dripping, then laced with irony, on a photocopy of the bill. First: “Really? You are going to lien my property for $3.23! Nice. You folks are fantastic.”

The second: “On 4/27/10 I sent in a check for $3.19. Thus, I owe .04. Please accept this check for ten cents just in case you folks don’t get around to processing my check until June or July. Keep the change. Duncan.”

This process, along with the time-consuming in-person appearances for permissions to deploy outdoor tables and signage, has not made Goodall a business believer in New Haven. “They should have an online form, paid with PayPal,” he suggested, instead of making people spend so much time writing letters and in city offices.

“This is not a good use of a businessman’s time.”

Goodall said his time should be spent building up his business or starting new ones. So many of the systems in play, he said, “are designed to make city employees’ lives easier, not business people.”

Goodall understands mistakes are made. He argued that the city bureaucracy’s tone could change.

“There’s no please or thank you. There’s a pervasive atmosphere of arrogance: Do what I say or else! The classic example: a lien on my property for $3.23.”

When asked for an explanation of the lien notice accompanying Goodall’s bill for $3.23, an assistant in the tax collector’s office referred a reporter to city spokesperson Jessica Mayorga. This was the city’s email response:

“After a taxpayer has failed to pay an outstanding personal property bill for more than four months, the city provides notice that liens may be placed on the property if the delinquency continues. The fact that a lien may be placed on an individual’s property does not mean that a lien will be placed, only that this remains a legally viable option for ensuring full payment of an outstanding tax debt. In this case, the taxpayer fully paid the outstanding debt and no legal action whatsoever was necessary.”

A call for explanation to the Corporation Counsel’s office was not returned.

Mayorga was asked for further clarification about Goodall’s specific case.

“As far as we know, the Tax Collector never received any of these letters. We are in the process of researching whether another department may have received such communication,” she responded.

Goodall kept copies of the letters. He’s pictured higher up in this story holding the copies.

Despite all this, Goodall said he is indeed starting a new business: “An online business. I don’t have to work with the city.”

Comments

posted by: Jay tee on May 14, 2010 10:26am

Welcome to a POS city run by liberals.

posted by: streever on May 14, 2010 10:32am

Wow. Goodall is a good guy & a hard worker. Can’t believe the way the city acted.

I hope they apologize.

posted by: DR on May 14, 2010 10:32am

Not to mention that it cost more to send the bill than the bill was for. This isn’t a government problem, however, I once got a bill from my oil company for $.01!

posted by: Yawn on May 14, 2010 11:17am

It sounds like Goodall was the one who made the mistake. He only paid half the taxes on his business, then blamed everyone else. Everyone knows that you accrue interest on unpaid taxes. He is making a mountain out of a mole hill.

posted by: INFO on May 14, 2010 11:22am

New Haven taxes can be paid online or by phone:

Payment services provided by Official Payment Corp.
Call 1-800-2PAY-TAX (1-800-272-9829) or visit http://www.officialpayments.com. There is a nominal fee for using this service. JURISDICTION CODE 1729.

posted by: JP on May 14, 2010 11:33am

The office for all this is at city hall how about walking the 2 blocks and find out what the deal is instead of writing letters back and fourth.

posted by: Doyens on May 14, 2010 11:40am

Want to save money in this year’s budget? Start with firing the city spokesperson. Her response was a non-response, useless and reflective of the arrogance that permeates City Hall. All those letters and her explaination is a version of “the dog ate my homework.”

This is what I mean by deploying technology to be taxpayer friendly - not just in terms of execution of routine business, but also to lower the head count needed in city offices to process all this paper and hold meetings.

Remember this story as your alderman vote and amend the Mayor’s budget calling for an 11 - 20+ percent property tax hike next week.

I have received such a letter too when I paid my property taxes a few days late and was never sent an invoice for the additional interest - here’s what I wrote back to our esteemed Tax Collector. And for the record, I had to write a second time because it took them so long to process the check I was afraid it would accumulate more interest or given my activism, give the city cause to rush a lien. Enjoy. g

September 30, 2009

Ms. Maurine Villani
Acting Tax Collector
City of New Haven
165 Church Street
New Haven, CT 06510

Dear Ms. Villani,

I am in receipt of your letter threatening to lien our property at 30 Birch Drive for the small amount of property tax due, which I surmise is because our payment of the extraordinary taxes on our modest home was a few days late. This most certainly is not principal. Enclosed, please find a check for $95.56.

Having said that, Ms. Villani, I see you continue City Hall’s practice of denigrating its hard working families by embracing this insulting letter and attaching your name to it. A simple invoice would have been fine and just as effective. After all, there can’t possibly be that many of us since the mayor was just crowing that his jackboot enforcement measures of these punitive taxes have yielded some 99% collection rate. Better still, since this appears to be a form letter, how nice it would have been if you and your staff had bothered to take the time to actually look at these accounts and choose those which needed a stronger letter as opposed to those of us with a history of paying and no direct knowledge that you had assessed this late fee.

Further, I don’t need a lecture of what my taxes pay for but of this you can be sure. The statement that my taxes pay for “schools, fire and police departments, as well as other essential services” is patently false. My taxes pay for services which in fact are not essential. They are luxuries and political gimmes that each year have declining returns for taxpayers. I won’t bore you with the details, but rest assured, if you were as familiar with the city budget as I am or directly paid taxes in this city as I do, you wouldn’t have included that statement.

My last observation is that it is long past time for the City of New Haven to harness technology to streamline government and actually make it convenient for taxpayers and others to access city services. We cannot pay our taxes or fines online for some reason - we must write checks or visit City Hall and stand in line. Why is that? To pay on line, we must use a third party and pay an extraordinary fee to do so. Other cities around the country have had this ability for a decade or more. Are we really so inept that we can’t figure this out? Even Hartford, the armpit of Connecticut posts its parking tickets on line. Amazing, huh?

In conclusion, I strongly urge you to re-vamp your collection policies and procedures and to choose invoicing over threatening. I know state law, because of the tax collector lobby, doesn’t require it, but how much simpler and more rewarding would this small step be, especially in light of the fact we pay higher property taxes than just about anybody in this entire country.

Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,

Gary Doyens
30 Birch Drive
New Haven, CT 06515
.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

Enclosure: Check for $95.56

posted by: Jay on May 14, 2010 11:42am

Sounds like it was a boilerplate generic letter. Not a big deal just pay the difference quite whining on it. It isn’t like they actually moved forward with a lien

posted by: citizen on May 14, 2010 1:00pm

JayTee, I’m a liberal (economic liberal), meaning what the Republican party pretends to still be. I’m also a social liberal (as in I support equality and human rights for all regardless of race, sex, or orientation, for example). I’m immensely proud of those facts. Your comment sounds cute but is without substance. I guarantee you that “liberalism” as is vaguely used by you is not causing tax collectors to do what they’ve been doing here. I would suggest following a different news source other than FN and the pill-popping bigot.

posted by: New Haven is for Lovers on May 14, 2010 1:32pm

Wow! Mr. Doyens your letter was incredibly rude and inaccurate. I paid my taxes online last year.

posted by: Concerned Citizen on May 14, 2010 1:43pm

This story simply amplifies what many of us who have done business with the City of New Haven have known for many years. Many city employees are rude, arrogant, ill-informed and have not yet learned that the City depends on responsible citizens—such as Mr. Goodall—for its bread and butter. If he informed them that the property had been sold, why didn’t the City send him a total bill for the entire year rather than a six months bill? (Yes, this would require a little independent thinking)Why should he have to pay interest on taxes they did not tell him that he owed? It seems NH now owes him. Mayorga is proving to be a liability. I wonder who is her connection to City Hall. NH residents are paying the price.

Another thing that is woefully missing among some (certainly not all) city and state employees is basic intelligence. They seem to lack the ability to think rationally for themselves; if it is not written out somewhere, they, the employees, cannot envision or understand it. This goes back to the political patronage with which NH and some other towns are so burdened. There are many inept NH City employees; it is egregious and stressful to have to deal with them. They NEVER admit to making a mistake; yet the City’s accounting and recording-keeping practices are abominable! Imagine how frustrating it must be for the smart employees to have to report to the incompetents.

“As far as we know, the Tax Collector never received any of these letters. We are in the process of researching whether another department may have received such communication,” she responded. PATHETIC Drivel.

To “Yawn” unless you are one of the City Hall insiders, or a tenant who do not have to pay taxes to the city, your turn will come. You clearly did not understand the issues in the article. When you sell your property, and you notify your town, they are supposed to prepare and give you a final tax bill to the date of the closing. Clearly NH did not do that. NH is not the only culprit in this; however, there are a few towns around that are run efficiently, and such bills are prepared and sent appropriately. It is sound business and commen sense to do this. It saves a lot of aggravation, it saves time & paperwork, and it might also build goodwill for the City.

posted by: Jeffrey Kerekes on May 14, 2010 2:55pm

Looks like the Mayor’s mop-up team are working hard to get things back under control. I appreciate the need for anonymity given people get fired for talking to the press, or for declining to serve on gubernatorial races, but not making people use their real names, allows city hall mop up teams to post under several pseudonyms and make it seem like people are mad at the citizens who are being taken advantage of by the City itself. We spend countless dollars on market new haven and economic development to attract people and then chase them out with aggressive parking tickets and tax collectors. The only people who blame the citizens are coming from the mayor’s office. Who else would blame a business owner for failing to pay FOUR CENTS???? No citizen would waste their time trying to defend the city and make a business owner look bad for failing to pay FOUR CENTS accept the mayor’s damage control team.

posted by: Our Town on May 14, 2010 4:21pm

Geez, to me this is such a heinous offence that I think he should be chained and slapped in a dungeon. When he get outs, he can work with our prisoner re entry people who will help him with his taxes.

posted by: Doyens on May 14, 2010 4:53pm

New Haven Is For Lovers:

I am the customer and the city is supposed to be here to serve my fellow citizens and me. That’s why they call it public service. And, you may have paid on line last year, but you also paid a fee to a third party of $60 or more to do so. If city hall employees are going to respond to my posts, use your name or at least, get your facts straight. There is entirely too much mind-numbing disinformation and outright fact errors handed by loyalists with the goal of silencing citizens from protesting ill-treatment from people whose very livelihoods depend on our checkbooks.

And by the way, I Can’t Afford To Love New Haven!

posted by: NEW HAVEN SUCKS on May 14, 2010 6:25pm

The people responsible for this should be fired. Period.

The problem in NH is, it’s run by a bunch of CYA-minded bullies, same as its school system, which wants to cut $1.5M from education yet refuses to start at Gateway, where there many, many “supervisors” and “assistant superintendents” making obsene money.

posted by: Ben Berkowitz on May 14, 2010 10:39pm

Bill O’BRIEN mistreated me as well and forced me into paying taxes that our business did not owe so that we could execute a contract with the city.

The problems in the assessors office are that IMHO of one man who I know many others have had the same problems with.

He needs to be removed from office yesterday.

posted by: Sean on May 14, 2010 11:08pm

Doyens -

So nice to see that you think schools, fire, and police are needless frills.

Why on earth do you live in a city?

And why didn’t you learn that revamp isn’t hyphenated? Were you skipping school that day, or is that not covered in “How to Write Ignorantly Rude Letters”?

posted by: eli on May 15, 2010 10:49am

had the 4cents been on his car, the good folks at crown towing would have wound up with it in thier possesion.
... i think the way new haven handles its business is shamefull.

posted by: Bill Saunders on May 16, 2010 1:34am

Ben,
That sounds like extortion to me—A Class B Felony.

posted by: V on May 16, 2010 7:40am

We, as taxpayers, must come to understand we exist to feed, and serve, the city bureaucracy. This government does not exist to serve its citizens.

Once we all come to terms with that simple truth, then we can begin to move on.

For me, that means not crying about taxes anymore. It does mean that I’m moving as soon as I can sell my house, to a place where government works for me, not the other way around.

posted by: cedarhillresident on May 16, 2010 12:18pm

Jeffery is right. The city has a spam team, i can most likely name them. But paul being the righteous editor allows all opinions…and all do matter even the spam teams.

But this is to the Mayors Spam Team.

Most have moved past that. As the old saying says… the gig is up! Most that read the comments now, dam well they are city staffers who’s top paying jobs are on the line! Who could care less about the citizens of this city that do not belong to there little group (little as a pose to MAJORITY) Time for change is upon us. if not now in the up and coming months. The fact is this city’s spending is out of control and once upon a time city workers worked for the people and not ONE MAN!
Citizens (AKA TaxPayer/renters) have little left to give. Time to stop the waste! Lets work together. Change can happen if you can let go of what was. And realize that it is not that way anymore. Be part of the cure! And make New Haven the city it can be.

posted by: cedarhillresident on May 16, 2010 12:30pm

Sorry but this song comes to mind….

http://ia350628.us.archive.org/3/items/rhgiveittime/cointelpro.mp3_vbr.mp3

posted by: Ben on May 16, 2010 7:47pm

Hey Bill,
It felt like extortion but I don’t think that’s what it is.

It felt more like ego than something devious. He treated me like a small child and told me about how it was impossible for our company to have no property in the city of New Haven last year and how all companies have servers and furniture and etc despite the fact that I told him I worked from Bru and all of the hosting was off site.

He has not clue about the way in which many small tech start-ups work and will run many out of town with an attidtude like that.

posted by: Morris Cove Mom on May 16, 2010 9:33pm

Wow! Another story about incompetence in our city? Not shocking.

The fact that he was smart enough to fight back in the proper way in encouraging, until you realize that this could happen to anyone.

The first time I had the pleasure of visiting the Tax Assessor’s office, in front of my was a young vet, just back from a tour of duty in Iraq, trying to find out to where they impounded his car. (It was towed while he was overseas, serving our country.) But they couldn’t find the car. Because they had misspelled his name, and mistyped his address. He was begging them to help him, so exhausted, practically yelling.

And I was shocked by what I saw. But not anymore. Now I understand the level of the city worker’s incompetence. I have seen my taxes double while spending in on the rise, I have had my own car towed from my neighborhood because of tax bill mistakes on the city’s part. I have been to more meetings and offices than I can count.

Good luck to Mr. Goodall and all those who are unfairly pursued by a city that doesn’t play by any rules, even its own.

posted by: Alphonse Credenza on May 17, 2010 12:55pm

It is true. There is a lot of rude down there at City Hall. (There are notable exceptions.)

But they don’t treat us at the counter any differently than they treat each other behind it.

What an awful place to work. (Replicated thousands and thousands of times across the nation.)

posted by: Mark on May 17, 2010 11:28pm

Goodall made the mistake… sounds like he just didn’t pay his bill on time… now he’s fighting interest charges??? would he have done that to his credit card if he was late? luckily the city doesn’t charge late fees like a credit card would.

posted by: Doyens on May 18, 2010 6:51am

Mark:

The city does charge interest like a credit caard - 18% to be exact. 1.5% per month. yeah. Even when they can’t be bothered to send an invoice.

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