S-23-0296 A&P II, LLC et al. (Appellants) v. Lancaster County Board of Equalization (Appellee) v. Housing Authority of the City of Lincoln, Nebraska, Intervenor v. Pedcor Investments-2010-CXXVI, L.P., et al., Other Parties of Record.
Appeal from Nebraska Tax Equalization and Review Commission (TERC)
Attorneys: Andrew R. Willis, Nathan D. Clark, and Kimberly A. Duggan (Cline Williams Wright Johnson & Oldfather, L.L.P. for Appellant), Daniel J. Zieg (Chief Deputy Lancaster County Attorney for Appellee), Eric J. Hamilton and Zachary B. Pohlman (Solicitor General and Asst. Solicitor General on behalf of Michael T. Hilgers, Attorney General for the State of Nebraska), Kari A.F. Scheer, Audrey R. Svane, Michael D. Matejka (Woods Aitken, LLP as Amici Curiae Brief on behalf of Community Development Resources, Lincoln Community Foundation, Lincoln Chamber of Commerce, Nebraska Housing Developers Association, Nebraska Housing Resource, and NeighborWorks Lincoln), Cathy S. Trent-Vilim (Lamson Dugan & Murray LLP as Amicus Curiae Brief on behalf of Nebraska Investment Finance Authority), Sydney L. Hayes and Daniel J. Gutman (Law Office of Daniel Gutman as Amicus Curiae Brief on behalf of Midwest Housing Equity Group, Inc.), and Scott Mertz, Jennifer Gaughan, and Mark T. Bestul (Legal Aid of Nebraska as Amicus Curiae).
TERC: Valuation of low-income housing tax credit properties.
Proceedings below: The Lancaster County Board of Equalization filed twenty-one petitions, pursuant to Neb. Rev. Stat. § 77-1333(10), which sought permission to use a professionally accepted mass appraisal method to determine the assessed values of rent-restricted housing projects, and the TERC granted Lancaster County Board’s petitions to use a different assessment methodology for the 2023 tax year. Appellant filed a Petition to Bypass the Court of Appeals, which the Supreme Court granted and ordered this case to be transferred from the docket of the Court of Appeals to its docket.
Issues: Appellant makes the following assignments of error: 1) The TERC erred in granting the BOE’s petitions because: a. it failed to individually consider each property and failed to deny the petitions due to the BOE’s failure to individually consider each property, b. it incorrectly determined that the assessed values of Appellants’ affordable housing projects, arrived at in accordance with § 77-1333, are inequitable and not in accordance with the law, c. it incorrectly determined that the BOE was not required to present an alternative valuation methodology, d. it granted petitions on projects other than the eight identified in the BOE’s evidence and advanced at the hearing, and e. it wrongly permitted the BOE to use an income approach modified from the method in § 77-1333; and 2) the TERC erred in granting the relief it did because: a. it granted relief other than that authorized by Neb. Rev. Stat. § 77-1333(10), and b. it granted relief other than that sought in the BOE’s petitions and authorized by § 77-5007(14).