21 nominated to Philadelphia property tax appeals board

With less than a month to go before the city replaces the Board of Revision of Taxes with a new property-tax system, Mayor Nutter on Wednesday announced the names of 21 people nominated to handle appeals requests.

"This is another important step forward in the city's shared goal of creating a system of property tax assessments and appeals that is just, equitable, and transparent," Nutter said.

The chair of the appeals board will earn $50,000 yearly, and the secretary, $45,000. Other board members will earn $150 per meeting up to $40,000 yearly.

The next step is for Nutter to whittle down the list to seven. He will then submit the names to City Council, which must approve them before Oct. 1, when the BRT ceases to exist and the new system begins operations.

The names include lawyers, real estate brokers, and property assessors.

Nominees include Sherman Toppin, a lawyer and Center City real estate broker who is the former son-in-law of T. Milton Street Sr., brother of former Mayor John F. Street. In 2008, Toppin testified during the case against Milton Street, who was convicted of failing to file federal tax returns on more than $2 million in income.

Toppin also is president of the Barristers' Association of Philadelphia, a group of prominent black lawyers.

Another nominee is Caroline Simon, a lawyer who issued one of the earliest warnings of potential problems at the Foundation for New Era Philanthropy, a fund-raising organization that in the mid-1990s was discovered to be a huge fraud.

Two other people on the list, Eugene Davey and Robert Zambrano, retired from jobs as BRT assessors.

Nominee DeBorah Giles runs a tax-planning company and included a letter of recommendation from City Council member Jannie L. Blackwell in her application. Another, Realtor Barbara Capozzi, was recommended by Council President Anna C. Verna.

A panel of seven people appointed by local business groups and others, including Verna, oversaw the nomination process.

Lauren Vidas, who has been providing administrative help to the nomination panel and is an assistant to the director of finance for the city, said the group considered people who had worked for the BRT because the law creating the new system requires the appeals board to include two assessors with at least 10 years of experience.

Efforts to eliminate the BRT followed an Inquirer series that documented political cronyism, questionable assessments, and other problems at the agency.

In May, Philadelphia voters approved a plan to abolish the BRT and replace it with the Office of Property Assessment and an independent Board of Property Assessment Appeals.

In July, Richie McKeithen became head of the Office of Property Assessment at a salary of $143,850.