Tax Sale of Home Stirs County to Action

Responding to a Times report about an 85-year-old man whose home was auctioned off over an unpaid $546 tax bill, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors took steps this week to prevent other homeowners from unduly losing their property in tax sales.

At a meeting this week, county Treasurer-Tax Collector Mark Saladino told the board that about 20 homes scheduled for auction this week had been pulled from the sale.

Some of the homes have listed the same owners “since the mid-1960s or the early ‘70s,” Saladino said. Those factors indicate that “it quite possibly could be a senior citizen who may have been unaware of their tax obligation.”

“So in order to prevent another problem like Mr. Dotson suffered, we went ahead and removed those properties from the auction,” Saladino said.

The Times recently detailed in an article how Terrell Dotson lost his Inglewood condominium when it was sold at auction to satisfy an unpaid tax bill. Dotson, who had owned the property free and clear, was left homeless by the sale.

Saladino said his office would check into the 20 properties pulled from the latest auction.

News of Dotson’s plight sparked a widespread response, and last week the Board of Supervisors ordered county agencies to find ways to improve the system.

In a motion introduced Tuesday, Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke said Dotson’s story “raised the inequities that presently exist in our property tax sale laws.”

Dotson, a World War II veteran, bought his Inglewood condo in 1995 and paid his taxes, though sometimes late and in odd amounts. But he failed to pay a tax bill that became due shortly after he purchased the property. That bill had been sent to the previous owner.

The county sent Dotson a delinquent tax bill that year, but in subsequent years, the delinquency appeared only in a small box on the regular tax bill. Dotson continued to pay his taxes, often in person, but did not pay the delinquent amount.

Months before the home was auctioned, the county sent Dotson notices, including one that was posted on his door of his condo. Dotson sent back one notice with a protest written across the bill. The county sold Dotson’s property in February 2002.

County officials later attempted to assist him, but said the sale was legal and could not be revoked. Dotson has since moved into housing for veterans.

He now has an attorney and is encouraged by the letters and offers of help prompted by the Times article.

“He was almost in tears,” said Reuben Taylor of the Inglewood Police Department. Taylor, along with Vacie Thomas of the Los Angeles Chapter of the NAACP, had assisted Dotson. “He’s an old man and he didn’t know anybody really cared that much.”

Burke’s motion instructs the county to take steps to prevent a recurrence of such problems, including meeting in some instances with property owners whose taxes are delinquent.