Home Lost Over Tax Bill of $546

In the auditorium at the Los Angeles County Arboretum, an auctioneer stood on stage before a crowd of 700 people and offered bidders the most valuable possession 85-year-old Terrell Dotson owned.

The minimum bid for the one-bedroom, one-bathroom Inglewood condominium was just $4,287 -- enough to pay back taxes, interest, penalties and the costs of selling the property. The county was selling the condo because, seven years ago, Dotson failed to pay one $546.81 tax bill.

When the bidding hit $81,000, the auctioneer bellowed, “Sold!”

With that, Terrell Dotson, an Army veteran of World War II, lost the home he had paid for in full -- and all that came with it.

“I bought this thinking I’d have lifetime security,” said Dotson, a diabetic who also has cancer. “I got a big surprise.”

Dotson’s transformation from proud property owner to motel resident, his rent paid by a local charity, is not a story of a tax scofflaw getting his comeuppance. It’s the story of a man and his home and what it means to grow old in a world that makes few exceptions for the complexities that come with age.

The condo on Tamarack Avenue represented a lifetime of work for Dotson, who was born in the segregated South, the son of a maid. War snatched Dotson from Tennessee, dropped him in Southern California for training, then sent him off to battlefields in Europe. He returned to California after the war.

By 1995, he had retired from Uniroyal Tire and a few other jobs and wanted to make sure he would “never be out on the streets.” Just before Christmas, he bought the condo -- paying $92,500 in cash -- and settled in. Outside was a pool and a Jacuzzi. He played golf. He went to church.

“I miss all of that,” Dotson said. “I had a nice place.”

When property tax season rolled around, Dotson often hopped in his car, headed downtown and paid in person at the tax collector’s office. So in 2002, when a man showed up at his door claiming to be the owner of his condo, it made no sense to him.

Vacie Thomas of the NAACP Los Angeles chapter was even more perplexed when she heard the story. She met Dotson last August when he walked into her office distraught about what sounded like a case of police abuse.

“He didn’t understand how the police could come in and pull him off his own property and put a gun to his head,” she recalled.

Thomas did not dismiss his story as the ramblings of an old man. Dotson, like many people his age, showed some diminished capacity, but he was still credible. So Thomas listened -- and called the Inglewood Police Department.

Police Called

Police denied that officers had pulled a gun on Dotson. But Thomas learned that Dotson’s property had been sold. She learned that, after Dotson had been released from a hospital stay, he had broken into the condo, believing it was still his, and found people living inside. That’s when police responded.

In November, Police Sgt. Rod Ramos listened to Dotson’s story and, after reading paperwork showing that Dotson had been paying his taxes, Ramos could not simply send the man on his way.

“Here’s a guy that served his country,” said Ramos, a Vietnam veteran. “I thought a veteran shouldn’t be treated that way.”

Nor did Inglewood Police Chief Ron Banks, who read Ramos’ entry about Dotson in the watch commander’s log. Banks looked into the matter and assigned Reuben Taylor, a program specialist with the department’s community affairs office, to the case.

Separately, the police and the NAACP began to unravel the story.

A few months after Dotson bought the condo in December 1995, the second installment of the annual tax bill, $546.81, became due. The original bill had been sent out in October in the previous owner’s name. According to county records, Dotson did not pay it. It is not clear why. But it is clear the problem could have been resolved.

The Los Angeles County treasurer and tax collector gives property owners five years to pay a delinquent bill before the property is offered for sale. An owner can buy more time by paying a delinquent bill before paying a current bill, or by paying on an extended plan.

Nobody explained that to Dotson, Taylor said. “They assume if you own your own property, you can handle your own affairs,” he said. “Most people can; sometimes they can’t.”

The tax collector does not hound debtors as credit card companies do. In fact, unlike some counties, Los Angeles County does not send separate bills each year regarding delinquent property taxes. State law does not require it, said Sharon Perkins, operations chief for the Secured Property Tax Division.

Owners receive one delinquent bill; after that, the only notification is a small box printed on the regular tax bill warning that back taxes are due. It lists no amount.

About eight months before a tax-delinquent property is auctioned off, the county begins sending notices. Dotson sent one back with a scrawled message: “This is a false statement.” On another, he wrote a cryptic protest.

A month before the sale, in accordance with state law, a county worker attempted to contact Dotson in person. There was no answer. The worker posted a notice of the upcoming auction on the door, Perkins said.

Thomas and Taylor note that Dotson owned the property outright, and had a reasonably good record of paying his taxes, though he sometimes paid late or wrote the wrong amount on a check. That should have alerted someone, they say, that the property might be owned by an older person or someone with a special need.

Studies support their contention. According to the federal Administration on Aging, of the 21.8 million households headed by older people in 2001, 80% were owners. Of that number, nearly 80%, like Dotson, owned their homes free and clear.

But county property records do not include an owner’s age. Nor is age listed in the one database that clerks consult in search of owners, Perkins said.

“If we knew that he was elderly or maybe didn’t understand,” the office could have referred him to another department or agency for help, she said. If he had called, she said, “We could have heard the voice, maybe, and made some determination.”

Dotson says when he went downtown to pay his taxes in person, no one asked him about back taxes. Those visits only added to the confusion. On June 19, 2002, nearly four months after the condo had been sold, Dotson went to the tax office and paid nearly $1,000 for taxes.

“They were still telling him he owned the property,” Thomas said.

Eventually, after receiving calls from the NAACP, Inglewood police and others, the tax collector’s office took the rare step of calling the new owner of the condo, Rosalio Granados. The tax collector offered to buy the property back and sell it to Dotson.

“We felt bad for Mr. Dotson,” Perkins said. “We wanted to assist him in any way we could -- although, from our review of the file, we did do everything that we’re required to do in accordance with the law.”

Granados and his wife agreed to sell, Thomas said, provided they received an additional $10,000 -- money Dotson, who lives on Social Security and a small pension, did not have. By the time Taylor found a donor to help, the couple had changed their minds, he said.

“I went to too much trouble” to buy the condo, said Rosalio Granados, a mail carrier. “As we can see, everything in this world is all about money. I had the money to buy it.”

The father of three said he had borrowed from family and friends to buy the condo, and is repaying with interest. He spent money on carpet and paint. Now he has rented out the property.

“If there’s a problem, it’s the county’s,” Granados said.

Dotson, who is single and has no children, had no place to go. Since losing his home, he has stayed with friends, slept in the condo manager’s office in Agoura Hills and lived in a motel.

With Taylor’s help, he has moved into an apartment.

“Here’s an 85-year-old man trying to start all over again,” Taylor said.

In an odd twist, the county now owes Dotson money -- the tax payments he made after the condo was sold, as well as the difference between the delinquent bill and the sale price. He stands to get at least $55,000, which in Los Angeles won’t buy much.

Thomas and Taylor continue pushing, hoping for the return of his property, for compensation or at the least for an attorney who can assist them. They believe the sale should be revoked because of diminished capacity.

The proud veteran is not ready to surrender to age, to be defeated by need. He rejects suggestions that would place him in the care of others. There is much he can still do: He drives to doctor’s appointments, gives himself daily injections of insulin, visits the senior center.

Red Flags Needed

“He’s really feisty,” Taylor said. “But in terms of understanding intricate, detailed kinds of things -- like tax assessments -- he needs assistance. He doesn’t like to let on that he doesn’t fully understand.”

Taylor and Thomas say the county’s procedure for selling property should be revamped to include red flags for age and special needs.

“This is America,” Taylor said. “We can do better.”

Thomas, who often fields calls from older people needing help, says Dotson’s dilemma illustrates a larger problem: People are “living longer, but you don’t have a sympathetic environment.”

Perkins said her office is “certainly open to any mechanism that would help and protect our seniors and those people who aren’t fully understanding. We don’t like this any more than Mr. Dotson. We try to do our best.”

For Dotson, time is running out. Under state law, former property owners have a year to contest a tax sale in court. Dotson’s year ends in March.

“I want my property back,” he said. “Then, when I get it back, let me think about what I’m supposed to do.”