Tax Glitch Burdens L.A. County Residents : Finance: Many in Antelope Valley get huge bills for parks assessment.

Ted Schnaidt likes parks as well as the next guy. Providing a green oasis here and there in the midst of Los Angeles County’s urban sprawl is a good thing, he agrees.

But the 63-year-old Antelope Valley man was unprepared for the tax bill he recently received. General tax levy, $915.52. OK. Special water fee, $88.03, Hmm. Solid waste fee, $3.51. Fine. L. A. County Park District Assessment, $5,694.10. Yikes!

Schnaidt is one of hundreds of property owners, living mostly on large lots in remote areas of the county, who have seen their tax bills increase by hundreds or thousands of dollars this year because of a new park district assessment that will generate $48 million a year for refurbishment of parks and recreation facilities.

County officials say they have been inundated with calls from concerned and confused residents and admit that assessments on a small fraction of the parcels may have been figured incorrectly.

“We don’t think it’s widespread, but of course that is no consolation for those people who have a problem,” said Karalyn Wallensak, a program administrator with the county Department of Parks and Recreation.

Most of the more egregious errors should be quickly corrected, while other disputed assessments will be reviewed, said Wallensak.

Property owners requesting a review of their bills still must pay the first installment by Dec. 10 or they will be subject to penalties.

The predicament has people like Schnaidt outraged and has attracted the attention of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn., which says it will mount a campaign to rescind the assessment.

“It’s a totally irresponsible thing,” said Schnaidt, a special effects maker for the entertainment industry who lives with his wife in the small community of Llano. “We don’t live a very elaborate lifestyle, we don’t drive new cars. There’s no way I can afford to pay it and I’m not going to.”

Another Llano resident, Frederick Childers, a 72-year-old retired electrical engineer, saw $109 added to his usual $65 tax bill on 17.5 acres of undeveloped land.

“I was horrified!” Childers said. “It’s quite obvious that someone living 30 miles east of Palmdale, out in the desert, with the nearest paved road two miles away, could hardly benefit from any park that is now in existence.”

The assessment is the product of Proposition A, which voters approved overwhelmingly in November. It created a $540-million assessment district aimed at improving parks and beaches, acquiring open space, constructing recreation facilities for young people and senior citizens and preventing graffiti.

Supervisor Mike Antonovich’s Antelope Valley office is getting as many as 40 calls a day, said secretary Mary Huckabay. “Some of them were very irate,” she said. “They didn’t remember it being on the ballot.”

The assessment, applied to nearly all 2.2 million parcels of land in the county, is based on the amount and use of the land. The formulas, predictably, are complex, and depend on whether the land is vacant, improved, partially improved, or used for commercial or industrial purposes. Agricultural lands are exempt.

Vacant land, for example, is assessed at a rate of $22 per acre, to a maximum of five acres. Under the formula, property owners with even huge vacant lots shouldn’t have to pay more than about $110.

Single family homes are calculated by a slightly different formula, and a home on one-sevenths of an acre, for example, would be assessed $12.52.

County officials are advising homeowners with an assessment of more than $120 and owners of agricultural lands who show an assessment to write and request a review.

Joel Fox, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn., said the assessment amounts to “cruel and unusual punishment for some landowners.”

“It seems a lot of people are being told that these huge increases are not a mistake but are based on the formula (for calculating the assessment). The thing is that if you want to change the formula you have to go back to the ballot,” Fox said.

Candace LePage, who lives with her retired husband on five acres in the Antelope Valley, said the assessment added $800 a year to her tax bill.

When contacted, county officials told the couple that they would have to pay the first installment. “Then, they would send a revised statement and take it off the second installment (next spring),” LePage said. “They’ll get the use of that money for that length of time.”

Wallensak admitted that officials are baffled by some of the enormous amounts showing up on bills.

One Sherman Oaks woman received a $21,600 park assessment, while an Antelope Valley rancher ended up with an $11,000 assessment, Wallensak said.

Regina Buehrle, 56, lives with her husband in a home on 160 acres of picturesque hills near Acton. The couple received a park assessment of $3,500.

“It’s a good thing I was sitting down after I realized I wasn’t reading it wrong,” said Buehrle. “My husband is getting ready to retire in January and we will be on a reduced income. We might be able to manage to pay it this time around but in the future, I don’t think so. We might end up having to dump our property and leave the state; in this economy, there’s not much hope of selling it.”

Paula Cox of Canyon Country said the tax bill on her 80 acres of hilly land jumped $1,789.

“I was absolutely appalled,” she said. “I just think it’s very cavalier of the employees of the government to tell us we have to pay this.”

Marnee Thompson, also of Canyon Country, said the new assessment added more than $3,500 to her normal $3,200 tax bill for her 160 acres of hilly land.

“I didn’t think I’d have to pay for the whole park,” Thompson said.

Even nonprofit property owners like the Boy Scouts have not been spared. The Western Los Angeles County Council received a whopping $24,000 park assessment on five campsites it owns. One parcel--the 600-acre Camp Jubilee in Pinion Hills--accounted for $17,000 of the total, said scout executive Hugh Travis. The Boy Scouts have asked parks officials to review the assessments.

“We don’t have $24,000 just to fork out,” Travis said. “Most camps don’t generate enough fees to break even. We might be forced to ask the community for contributions to pay for it, but in this economic environment, that’s not a very easy task. We could be forced to sell some of our properties. It would be ironic if a measure designed to acquire parks and open space ended up reducing them.”

Property owners who would like to request a review should write to:

Los Angeles County Regional Parks and Open Space District co/Department of Parks and Recreation, 433 S. Vermont Ave., Los Angeles CA 90020, Attn.: Assessment Review. Or call, (213) 738-2981.

Times staff writer Phil Sneiderman and special correspondent Doug Alger contributed to this report.