Irish Channel Neighborhood Association

Irish Chanel Neighborhood Association

What: Quarterly General Membership Meeting Agenda

When: Thursday, June 12^th, 2008

Where: Irish Channel Christian Fellowship Church

            819 First Street (between Laurel & Annunciation)

Please mark your calendars for this meeting- we will have three presentations important to the neighborhood:

1)      Robert Mendoza, street project manager will provide a status on the project and take your questions and comments.

2)      New Orleans Redevelopment Authority (NORA) – As you may be aware, ICNA has been working with NORA to match blighted housing to developers willing to rehab the homes and get them back into commerce. ICNA is proud to be the first neighborhood association in the city to participate in the program. Harvey Stern and Charles Burck (ICNA Zoning Committee) will report on the status of the project.

3)      Crime-  We will discuss what the neighborhood is doing to be proactive as the summer approaches, including reporting what your council representatives are doing to combat crime and our own initiatives to track crime within the Irish Channel to insure accountability.

Refreshments will be served and input welcomed!

Please contact me with any questions, and we hope to see you there-

Theresa Conrad - (webmaster-AT-irishchannel.org)
Secretary

Below follows information about your tax assessments and how to appeal them as presented by Stacy Head at the August meeting. 

District B Councilperson Stacy Head took the floor in Betty Jefferson’s absence to discuss the issue of tax assessments. She offered the following points:

• Visit www.opboa.org to find all kinds of local information, compare your assessments to your neighbors and make sure they’re in line
• The 15^th is the last day assessors are required to see people
• Ms. Head understands that assessors are now seeing people
• Even if you cannot get into City Hall, send the appeal form in
• Betty Jefferson is using a different form from the other assessors- make sure you have the correct form.
• Get a mailing receipt to protect yourself
• Keep extra copies of all forms and proof you’ve submitted in time
• If you want to bypass the assessor, you have until the 20^th to file an appeal directly to the City Council
• It is within your rights to submit directly to the board of review, but she advises you to Betty first.
• Stacy Head will likely be our representative on that board.
• Even if you do get a satisfactory response from the assessor, make sure you get it in writing or it doesn’t matter.
• Provide documentation- appraisals, comparable properties from recent sales are ideal

Appeals will start being heard by the Board of Review on September 15 and go until October 10^th. The process should go quickly, and they will be in session extra hours and weekends to make sure it all gets done in time.

If you have filed for an appeal, your appearance date will be mailed to you.

If you do not get a satisfactory result from the Board of Review, you will have ten days to appeal to

Ms. Head went on the explain that City Council has agreed that millage needs to be rolled back, but they are only in charge of half the rate- the school board is in charge of the other half and they will not commit to a reduction in the tax rate.

She went on to state that property taxes are actually a small percentage of the city budget, which sees more income from sales tax and other fees than property taxes, and she wants to keep it that way. She is personally lobbying for lower millage rates.