Wonder if Middleboro will notice?

This case seems to have potential in Middleboro if the Board of Assessors chose to act.

From Kopelman and Paige, P.C. :

Assessment cases involving mobile home parks are rare, and there is little precedent for municipal officials to follow. Now, in the case CJD Real Estate Limited Partnership v. Board of Assessors of the Town of Chelmsford, et al., (Appellate Tax Board Nos. F298316 & F304236) the Appellate Tax Board (“ATB”) has rejected a mobile home park’s claim that its property was worth $3,880,500, and valued it at $10,000,000 and $9,938,300 for fiscal years 2008 and 2009 respectively. The subject property consisted of approximately 37.75 acres, improved with roads, 254 site pads, and other infrastructure necessary for the operation of a manufactured home community. The park owner, CJD, claimed that it was entitled to the benefit of the exemption from taxation enjoyed by the individual mobile home owners. At trial, the Town presented facts and law that clearly demonstrated CJD’s position on its supposed entitlement to an exemption was meritless.

The Town’s case proved the value of the Appellant’s property by using the income approach to valuation. This was consistent with CJD’s witnesses’ testimony that CJD derives income from the rental of site pads on which manufactured homes are parked. The ATB concluded that the use of the income approach to valuation was proper in assessing the park, and consistent with the manner in which mobile home park owners themselves value such properties for investment purposes.

Celebrate Earth Day: April 22nd

Consider learning about the Earth, learning about the issues.

Consider the Appliance Rebates.

Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org was interviewed on WBUR - worth listening to.

Finding Ways To Mark Earth Day's 40th

Author and environmentalist Bill McKibben talks about small steps people can take to reduce carbon emissions. Climatologist Kevin Trenberth discusses research suggesting that the Earth's atmosphere is trapping more heat than before, and the mystery of where excess heat is being stored.

Environment Massachusetts
MassCleanEnergyCenter
thedailygreen


Maybe consider where your energy comes from.

Few people were aware of Massey Energy until its most recent mine explosion that killed workers because of safety problems.

Read about Massey's union busting tactics here

Massey Energy is one of the largest coal companies in the United States, and certainly one of the most controversial. In April 2010 the company received a great deal of negative attention when an explosion at one of its mines in West Virginia killed 29 workers. It later came out that the mine in question had been cited more than 1,000 times for safety violations, and that Massey had similar problems at many of its other facilities. Massey, which for two decades was owned by the engineering giant Fluor, is also notorious for its aggressive anti-union stance and for environmental problems such as a massive coal sludge spill and its reliance on terrain-destroying mountaintop removal projects.

Think about speaking out to expand the bottle bill

As you likely know, the Bottle Bill -- the 5 cent redeemable deposit on some beverage containers -- has been the law for more than 25 years in the Bay State. It is the single most successful recycling program in the state, if not the country, with more than 70% of these containers being recycled.

E-mail your representative today and ask him or her to help pass the Updated Bottle Bill.

But beverages have changed over the years, and the original law needs an update. The reason that bottled water, iced teas, vitamin waters and similar drinks don't have the 5 cent deposit is simply because they were not on the supermarket shelves back in the early 1980s when the law passed. If we had the Bottle Bill deposit on those kinds of drinks, we'd catch 1 billion containers each year, which now end up on the ball fields, the beaches, the playgrounds, or in landfills and incinerators.

Seems like a no-brainer, right? But the bill has been bottled up for years. At the most recent hearing on the bill, there were well over 100 supporters in the room, including the League of Women Voters, the Sierra Club, the Mass Municipal Association and more. The opponents? Lobbyists for Pepsi, for the bottled water companies, for the liquor stores. It looked and sounded to all of us in the hearing room like the public interest versus the the powerful special interests. So we just have to make the public interest voice louder. And that's why I'm asking you to e-mail your legislator today and ask them to get the Updated Bottle Bill out of committee and moving along towards passage.

http://www.masspirg.org/action/healthy-communities/all-legs-bb?id4=es


“We Are Tearing Down Our Mountains”: Photojournalist Antrim Caskey on West Virginia’s Fight Against Mountaintop Removal Coal Mining


The Environmental Protection Agency took a significant step last week toward blocking one of Appalachia’s largest and most disputed mountaintop removal coal mines. On Friday the EPA proposed a veto of the Clean Water Act permit issued by the Army Corps of Engineers for the Spruce No. 1 Mine in West Virginia. Earlier this month, we interviewed Antrim Caskey, a photojournalist who has been chronicling the nonviolent fight against mountaintop removal coal mining. Her new book is Dragline.

Greenpeace:

Report: Global Warming Skeptics Bankrolled by Koch Industries
A new report from Greenpeace has identified a privately owned US company with ties to the oil and chemical industry as the paymaster of global warming skeptics in the United States and Europe. According to Greenpeace, Koch Industries has spent nearly $48 million since 1997 to fund groups that question global warming.

Where have you heard that name before? Maybe here ?

Arctic Methane on the Move?

Methane is like the radical wing of the carbon cycle, in today’s atmosphere a stronger greenhouse gas per molecule than CO2, and an atmospheric concentration that can change more quickly than CO2 can. There has been a lot of press coverage of a new paper in Science this week called “Extensive methane venting to the atmosphere from sediments of the East Siberian Arctic Shelf”, which comes on the heels of a handful of interrelated methane papers in the last year or so. Is now the time to get frightened?

Twenty Ethical Questions that the US Press Should Ask Opponents of Climate Change Policies.

If the Road to a Clean Energy Future Seems Too Long, Check Your MapIf the Road to a Clean Energy Future Seems Too Long, Check Your Map

Maybe the best way to celebrate Earth Day is to think about the Earth.

Empire State Building Retrofit

From Rocky Mountain Institute, one can always expect impressive information and results.

Below is some recent information and the point is well taken that reducing the costs of energy improves the bottom line or for the homeowner, money in your pocket.

We are excited to announce that, along with project partners Jones Lang LaSalle, Clinton Climate Initiative and Johnson Controls, RMI has won the Sustainable Building Industry Council’s "Beyond Green High Performance Building Award" for the retrofit of the Empire State Building!

The award was presented February 25 on Capitol Hill during an educational briefing for the High Performance Buildings Congressional Caucus Coalition.


A Blueprint for Success


In April of 2009, we shared with you initial news of the Empire State Building retrofit. Now, ten months later, this iconic project has drawn attention to efficiency improvements and encouraged other building owners to follow suit. It has become a great example of what can cost-effectively be done in existing buildings to benefit the owner, occupants and the environment.

"As our nation pursues strategies that allow us to use our natural resources more efficiently, a focus on high-performance buildings is a must," SBIC Executive Director Bud DeFlaviis stated. "Rocky Mountain Institute and their partners have demonstrated the role that retrofits will play in this effort. Their work will undoubtedly help inspire other forward-thinking building practitioners who are creating a new generation of buildings that are mindful of the people they serve and the environment they impact."




RetroFit


This award comes at a great time, with RMI launching our new initiative, RetroFit. Building off both the success and lessons learned from our Empire State Building project, this initiative--which will be funded in large part by philanthropy--aims to encourage the retrofit of the entire U.S. commercial building stock to use, on average, 50 percent less energy by 2050.

We look forward to keeping you updated on further details on the RetroFit initiative, as we draw closer to launch!

Taxes are for the little people

Courtesy of OakPointCommunity.org

Middleborough Taxpayers:

There are few things more glaringly unfair in this country than the fact that some people and some businesses get taxed at a rate less than most of the rest of us pay. Our government gives bailouts to big business. I've written recently about the tax assessments of a number of specific, high value commercial properties which have sold recently.


Apparently, some taxpayers don't need a TIF to insure a reduction in taxes. Let.s call it a TIP, To Insure Prosperity.


154 Campanelli Drive sold in 2006 for 19.1 million. It appears it was assessed for $19 million for FY 08 and 09. This year it was assessed for 14.9 million. Did they get an abatement in FY 09? Were we told a "public pension fund" bought it?



MIDDLEBORO, MA Net Lease Capital

Advisors, Inc. has completed another

property acquisition on behalf

of its joint venture program

with a major domestic public pension

fund advised by AEW Capital

Management, L.P. The joint venture,

which focuses on acquiring

net leased industrial, office, and

retail properties on an all-cash basis,

closed the $19.1 million purchase

of a 275,000 s/f warehouse

property located in a masterplanned

industrial park. Net Lease Capital and AEW view this property as a mid-to-long-term

investment.


This year they paid about $186,995 in taxes. If they were assessed closer to their fair market value, what they paid for it, they would have paid about $239,700. They get a tax "TIP" of about $52,700.00!


They asked for and got a tax abatement this year and likely last year. Their assessment was just lowered to $12.4 million. It was just a little TWEAK to the depreciation, from 25% to 40%, for a building built in 2000. That's an additional $31,000! A total of $83,000 tax "TIP".


OH! Just so happens this property WAS GETTING A TIF! They had their TIF revolked this year and so, applied for a tax abatement from the assessors. The assessors gave them an additional $31,000 abatement because they lost their TIF.



151 Campanelli Drive sold in November of 2007 for about 9 million. It's assessed for $6,063,500. This year they paid about $76,100 in taxes. If they were assessed closer to their fair market value, the price they paid for it, they would have paid about $112,950. They get a tax "TIP" of about $36,853.00.



Number 17 Cowan Drive (the FedEx property) sold in January, 2007 for about 7.9 million dollars. It's assessed for $4,113,600. This year they paid about $51,626 in taxes. If they were assessed closer to their fair market value, the price they paid for it, they would have paid about $99,145. They get a tax "TIP" of about $47,519.


A portfolio of seven Federal Express Ground distribution facilities -- including one in Massachusetts -- was sold for $52.3 million. The 546,120-square-foot portfolio includes buildings in Georgia, Idaho, Ohio, South Carolina, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and Maine. One of the seven is a 73,137-square-foot facility in Middleborough, Mass. Most of the facilities were recently built.


Number 19 Cowan Drive , vacant commercial land, sold in September, 2008 for about 1.4 million dollars. It's assessed for $927,400. This year they paid about $11,640 in taxes. If they were assessed closer to their fair market value, the price they paid for it, they would have paid about $17,600. They get a tax "TIP" of about $5,931.00. Oh! Last year, Fiscal 2009, this property was assessed for 159,900. How can a 1.4 million property be assessed for 159,900 in the year it sold?


New England Tel. & Tel. simply asked the assessors for a tax abatement and it was granted. No questions asked. No documentation provided. No data verified. For some, it's "Ask and you shall receive." I advised another town to DENY this same taxpayer's appeal on a similar property. My value (per square foot) was double that of the Middleborough assessors.


These are just a few properties that I selected. Are we to believe everything else is correct? These "under-valuations", these TIPS, go on and on, from year to year. With only these few properties, the total TIP is about $175,000 per year. How much more is going on? Is this good decision making by the Board of Assessors?


I also question whether we have been calculating the real TIF exemptions properly or not. What do you think?


A "little guy" property, 123 East Grove Street , bought recently for $760,000. It's assessed at $741,400. No "TIP" for you. 84 South Main Street bought recently for $1,425,000 is assessed at $1,276,000. No "TIP" for you. 395 Plymouth Street recently sold for $975,000. It.s assessed at $930,700. No "TIP" for you. The "little guys" usually don't have lawyers. And,..hey're "little guys."


Regarding residential properties; I reviewed the data for properties of those taxpayers at the town's website. About thirty percent of the properties I looked at had what I suspect to be errors of data, errors of fact. Measurements were apparently wrong when comparing the sketch to the photo. Story heights (full story, three quarter story, half story) were inconsistent. Depreciation appears to be subtly random. The errors could be considered "minor", but if I can see them, why can't the assessors who work with this data daily? Why aren't they fixed? Errors in factual data result in errors in taxation! Some values were too high. Some values were too low. The result is: Some taxes were too high. Some taxes were too low. If you can't get the facts right, how can you assure the taxpayer your methodology is correct?

As your assessor I promise:

To expand awareness within the department of valuation issues and taxpayer expectations.
To initiate programs to more accurately describe and assess property.
To first correct, and then minimize, "mistakes" in the office, utilizing the existing staff.
To make the best decisions possible based upon the most accurate data available.
To assess fairly.
I have made no misrepresentations or falsehoods. I have questions. I stand behind my assertions that the assessment data is riddled with errors and fraught with poor judgment.

I can make it better. I'll look after all taxpayers. I ask for your vote for Assessor in this year's election. Let us strive for FULL and FAIR assessments for every taxpayer, big as well as small. Please tell your friends and relatives in Middleborough to vote for me. I need every vote possible.


Charles Shea, Candidate for Assessor.

e-mail: sheachuck@yahoo.com

Billionaires for Wealthcare

We'll let our friends from Health Care for America Now do the talking on this one:"Billionaires Get It Done: Dollar Throw Sets New Standard in Political Satire

The nation's premier band of merry political pranksters struck again today, showering Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) with real dollar bills in satirical appreciation for the Republican party's mindless obstructionism and advocacy for Big Insurance throughout the health reform debate. The event, staged with military precision by Billionaires for Wealthcare, created iconic images that will almost certainly be used for years to come to illustrate the political prostitution of McConnell and the GOP."




The Billionaires for Wealthcare thank Sen. Mitch McConnell and the GOP for their heroic attempts to kill health care reform by showering him with real cash.

And that money is just a drop in the bucket, with big insurance and allies unleashing a 5 million dollar a week torrent to block health reform. That's dollars from your premiums, going to pay 6 lobbyists for every Member of Congress. (And they still lost!)

While this may be amusing, it raises important issues about allowing lobbyinsts and Big Corporations to govern.

Earth Day: April 22nd

If you're frustrated with escalating energy bills, have an old appliance that's guzzling electricity, consider doing your homework and participating in the program explained below.

While you're at it, take a look at some of the other information available on the Mass Save site that might offer solutions to pocket the savings.

Appliance exchange program coming next month


Starting on April 22 — Earth Day — Massachusetts residents can get money back when they replace their current home appliances with new, more energy-efficient versions.

The Great Appliance Exchange, as the initiative has been dubbed, will run until May 5 and provide rebates ranging from $50 to $250 when consumers buy approved washing machines, dishwashers, refrigerators and freezers.

The Great Appliance Exchange
What you get

Rebates on purchases of energy-efficient appliances: $250 for dishwashers, $200 for refrigerators, $175 for washing machines and $50 for freezers.

For more information

Visit masssave.com and click on 'For Your Home,' or call 617-626-7350.
The appliances included in the program are all Energy Star certified, a designation that indicates a product offers significant energy savings and is more energy-efficient than others of its type.

Purchases must be made from approved retailers, buyers must have their new appliances delivered to their home and old appliances must be hauled away for recycling when the new machines are delivered.

The $6.2 million program, funded by money from the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act, is intended to spur sales at Bay State businesses and to generate energy savings for consumers.

Prospective appliance buyers interested in participating must first reserve their rebates online; the reservation form will be available at masssave.com on April 22. Consumers will be able to make reservations for as long as funds remain available.

"If you get a reservation and you follow all the other steps "» then the rebate is assured," said Lisa Capone, spokeswoman for the state Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs.

New appliances must be purchased by May 5 in order to be eligible for the rebate.

Twelve Cape and Islands locations are among the program's approved appliance stores.

At Wright's TV's and Appliances in Harwich, customers have already started inquiring about the program, said manager Ron Boyle.

"They're very eager," he said. "It will be a lot of business for us."

In Provincetown, potential buyers have been less curious, said Debbie Trovato, co-owner of Joe and Son Appliance Center.

"It doesn't really appear that too many people know about it," she said.

While she hopes the initiative will bring in some business, she also noted the program's potential for spreading awareness of local environmental concerns and the benefits of energy efficient appliances.

"Hopefully it will make people more aware of the energy savings and how they help the environment by doing this," she said.

Looming Oil Crunch

Barclays and Bank of America see looming oil crunch

For oil markets, it as if the Great Recession never happened. Surging demand in China, India and the Middle East is making up for decline in the debt-crippled West, ensuring another global crunch within three or four years.

Bank of America and Barclays Capital, two leading oil traders, have told clients to brace for crude above $100 (£64) a barrel by next year, before it pushes relentlessly higher over the decade. This is a stark contrast from recessions in the 1980s and 1990s, when it took years to work off excess drilling capacity built in the boom.

"Oil has the potential to flirt with $100 this year. We forecast an average price of $137 by 2015," said Amrita Sen, an oil expert at BarCap. The price has doubled to $78 in the last year.


Why would climate change chief defect to business? "The groundwork for the next sustained step up in oil prices is now almost complete. Global spare capacity is likely to be reduced to low levels within a relatively short time. The global economic crisis has postponed, but not cancelled, a crunch which would otherwise be starting to bite now," said Barclays.

Francisco Blanch, from Bank of America Merrill Lynch, said crude may touch $105 next year, with $150 in sight by 2014. "Approximately 1.7bn consumers in emerging markets with a per capita income of $5,000 to $20,000 are eagerly waiting to buy cars, air-conditioning units, or white goods," he said.

China has overtaken the US as the world's top car market. Mr Blanch expects oil demand to rise by a further 2.8m barrels per day (bpd) in China and 2.5m bpd in India by 2015, when two giants will be absorbing the lion's share of Gulf output. Consumption in the West has already peaked and will fall each year as populations shrink and we waste less, but the West no longer sets the price. Global use will increase by 8.8m bpd to 95m bpd.

Supply is scarce. Sir Richard Branson warned this month that the world faces 'peak oil' within five years. "Don't let the oil crunch catch us out in the way that the credit crunch did," he said.

Mr Blanch said output from non-OPEC states is falling by 4.9pc each year, despite Russia's reserves. Saudi Arabia and the Emirates can plug a quarter of the gap, but global spare capacity must soon drop to wafer-thin levels – leaving us vulnerable to the sort of "super-spike" seen in 2008. The wildcard is whether Iraq can quadruple output to Saudi levels this decade, a target dismissed by most analysts as pie-in-the-sky.

Painfully high prices are needed to unlock fresh supplies as reserves are depleted in the North Sea and the Gulf of Mexico. Deep-water rigs off Brazil are costly and require drilling far below the seabed. Canadian oil sands and US biofuels have break-even costs near $70. While the US, UK, and the Far East are turning to nuclear power, it takes a decade to build reactors. "peak uranium" lurks in any case.

The oil spike brought the global economy to a shuddering halt in 2008. This time the crunch may hit before the West has fully recovered. Whatever happens, the US, Europe and Japan will soon transfer a chunk of their wealth to the petro-powers. It is a new world order.