Board of Equalization and Review

Meeting recap

What happened, drawn from the records published after the meeting. Minutes

The board decided 18 of 19 scheduled appeals; one afternoon case did not go forward. It reduced 11 assessments and left seven unchanged, cutting their combined value from $8,538,000 to $7,706,100, a drop of $831,900. Most reductions landed on the county's own recommended figure, not the owner's lower ask. Two went further. The board fully accepted a homeowner's own $405,000 estimate for a Bennington Drive house, below the county's proposed $454,900. And it cut Abriata Group LLC's McCauley Street assessment to $501,900, below both the county's $786,700 recommendation and the $515,000 the company requested, after inspectors found the property's two 1938 and 1939 houses needed significant repairs.

The LLC's owner also personally appealed the neighboring McCauley Street parcel that morning. The board reduced that one too, from $783,700 to $672,700, after reclassifying the building from a multifamily apartment to a two-to-four-family residence. Three of the day's properties sat in Chapel Hill's Northside district; the board reduced one and left two unchanged. One Church Street appeal was left unchanged, but a representative from the Jackson Center asked afterward to move it to the board's January 21 session.

How the votes went

All 18 decisions passed without recorded dissent among the three members present, with Leon Meyers, Saru Salvi and Richal Vanhook rotating as movant and seconder throughout both sessions.

From the published minutes.