Recent Developments in Indiana Taxation - I.U. School of Law ...

2007] TAX LAW 1157
presumption that the assessment is correct is to provide a professional appraisal
of the property, use information such as “actual construction costs, sales
information regarding the subject or comparable properties,” or other information
as long as the additional information was available to the assessor at the time of
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the assessment. The Eckerlings did not provide any of this evidence, focusing
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instead on the alleged failure of the assessor to follow the guidelines. This is
not sufficient to rebut the presumption that the assessment was correct so the
final determination of the BTR was affirmed. 579
580
3. PIA Builders & Developers, LLC v. Jennings County Assessor. —In this
consolidated opinion, the Tax Court denied three substantially identical petitions
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for rehearing by separate taxpayers. The taxpayers argued that: 1) assessing
officials can only use the cost approach for assessing property; 2) the assessing
officials in the cases at bar ignored that law and adjusted the assessments to more
accurately reflect the properties’ market values-in-use; and 3) the Tax Court
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“endorsed the misapplication of the law” in making the rulings that it did. The
Tax Court reiterated what it “explained in great length” in the cases below: that
the goal of the new assessment system in Indiana is to accurately reflect a
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property’s market value-in-use. The assessment guidelines provide a variety
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of assessment approaches, including the cost approach. Further, the guidelines
state that the cost approach is merely a starting point for determining a property’s
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market value-in-use. The old system of assessment considered an assessment
to be accurate if the regulations were correctly applied while the new system
focuses more on ensuring that the assessed value is actually correct than on strict
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application of regulations. The Tax Court denied the petitions saying that
under the new system, a taxpayer cannot argue form over substance but must
show that the assessed value is not an accurate reflection of the property’s market
value-in-use. 587
588
4. BP Products North America, Inc. v. Matonovich. —BP Products North
America, Inc. (BP) owned land and improvements in Lake County, Indiana, and
initiated this action on April 4, 2003, to appeal the BTA’s denial of its June,
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2000, petitions for review of assessments made in 1999. In June 2000, BP
made 79 separate claims of review of assessments to the SBTC, claiming that its
577. Id.
578. Id.
579. Id.
580. 842 N.E.2d 899 (Ind. Tax Ct. 2006).
581. Id. at 899-900.
582. Id. at 900.
583. Id.
584. Id.
585. Id.
586. Id.
587. Id. at 900-01.
588. 842 N.E.2d 901 (Ind. Tax Ct. 2006).
589. Id. at 902-03.