A state appeals court has sided with the city of Madison in a dispute over property assessments with developer Terrence Wall, the Wisconsin state Journal reports.
In a decision issued Thursday, the three-judge panel of the 4th District Court of Appeals overturned a lower court ruling in Wall’s favor. It ruled that the city’s 2019 assessment for the east side Madison’s Veritas Village apartment building — located at 110 N. Livingston St. — does not violate the Wisconsin Constitution’s uniformity clause, as was ruled by a Dane County judge in November 2022. The clause promotes tax uniformity by requiring all property owners to pay taxes in equal proportion to the full value of their property.
A slightly different three-judge panel of the appeals court’s 4th District in October agreed with another Dane County judge that the city’s 2018 assessment for Veritas Village was not excessive.
Wall has sued the city over the 2020, 2021, and 2022 assessments for the building; the suits are being heard as one case, which is set for trial late next year. Veritas Village had initially challenged the city’s 2019 assessment as excessive but instead argued later that its stated market value violated the uniformity clause.
