David Lee

David Lee has six years of experience in assessment administration at the state level.  He began work as Executive Secretary for the State Assessors Board in June of 2007.  He has also worked as the Equalization Director for Calhoun County and as the assessor for the City of Portage in Kalamazoo County.  David holds a Level 4 certification in Assessment Administration from the State Assessors Board, a Personal Property Examiner Certification from the State Tax Commission, and both a Bachelor of Arts degree and a Bachelor of Business Administration degree from Eastern Michigan University.

Thursday

April 24, 2008

What is the State doing to help improve assessing practices?

As noted yesterday by Kelli Sobel, roughly 1/3 of the local units that have undergone a 14-Point Review have been deemed deficient.  This means a portion of Michigan’s property tax base may have been established through flawed assessing practices.  As a property tax professional, I believe we can do better and I expect municipalities which rely on property taxes for revenue would like to do better as well.

The State Assessors Board (SAB) is the agency responsible for training and certifying assessing officers.  Although the causes of problems uncovered by a 14-Point Review could be debated, it is clear that enhanced educational efforts can be part of the solution.  I may be dating myself, but for as long as I have been in this field, the SAB has had a continuing education program for assessing officers.  And, this year, the SAB developed a mandatory continuing education seminar for all assessing officers with a specific focus on the deficiencies found in the 14-Point Review process.

In addition to the relevance of the new continuing education program, the quality of the program materials and instruction have been highly rated.  More than 400 assessing officers have attended the program to date, with approximately 80 percent rating the program and its instruction as either good or excellent.  Being an assessor and having stood in front of many assessors as an instructor, I can say this bluntly:  Assessors can be a difficult group to please.  So we are proud of the high ratings this program has received so far.  For the first time, the continuing education of assessors has a mandatory quiz to inject a measure of accountability into the continuing education process.

Plans are being made to develop similar mandatory programs for each of the next three years which will continue to focus on 14-Point Review deficiencies.  In addition, the SAB has doubled the number of continuing education hours required of assessing officers.  The board has been busy doing what it can to help improve assessing practices in Michigan.

You may contact David Lee at 517-335-1215 orleed2@michigan.gov. 

For further details on recent continuing education initiatives of the State Assessors Board, these documents are provided:2007-2008 Certification Renewal Program Announcement, 2007-2008 Six-Hour Renewal Program Evaluations Announcement, and 2008-2009 Certification Renewal Hours Increase Announcement.

Check back tomorrow when Kelli Sobel will complete this week’s Guest Blog, with a discussion on what the future holds with regard to the 14-Point Review.