Justia Georgia Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

Plaintiffs James Hansen and 30 other DeKalb County residents sought to obtain certain information from the DeKalb County Board of Tax Assessors in connection with their 2012 property tax assessments. The trial court denied Plaintiffs’ request for a mandamus nisi, and they appealed. Plaintiffs filed their requests for information each seeking information regarding the appraisal and assessment of his or her property for the 2012 tax year. The trial court found that plaintiffs' claims were not cognizable under the Georgia Open Records Act or in mandamus. The Supreme Court found no error in that decision, and affirmed. View "Hansen v. Dekalb Cty. Bd. of Tax Assessors" on Justia Law

Landowners appealed the Superior Court of Monroe County's denial and dismissal of their petition for a writ of mandamus and related adverse rulings involving their real property tax appeals. Finding no reversible error, the Supreme Court affirmed the Superior Court. View "Newton Timber Co., L.L.L.P. v. Monroe County Bd. of Tax Assessors" on Justia Law

On remand, the trial court granted summary judgment to the Georgia Revenue Commissioner on Southern LNG, Inc.'s request for the writ of mandamus, on the ground that Southern had an adequate alternative remedy in the form of tax appeals brought under OCGA 48-5-311. The court said that Southern could raise, and had raised, its statutory claim that it was a public utility required to return its property to the Commissioner rather than to Chatham County in appeals of the county’s tax assessments to the county board of equalization and then to the Chatham County Superior Court. Upon second review of this case, the Supreme Court concluded the trial court's analysis was incomplete: "the Chatham County tax appeals, as currently constituted, appear not to provide Southern with an adequate alternative to mandamus. . . . The parties have not briefed [their] issues here or below; the trial court did not address them; and this Court should not try to resolve them in the first instance." Accordingly, the Court vacated the trial court's grant of summary judgment to the Commissioner and remanded the case for further proceedings. View "Southern LNG, Inc. v. MacGinnitie" on Justia Law

The issue on appeal before the Supreme Court was whether the appellate court in "Georgia Dept. of Revenue v. Moore," (730 SE2d 671 (2012)) correctly determined that, once the Georgia Department of Revenue settles a refund action with one responsible party against whom unpaid sales taxes were assessed, the Department was thereafter precluded by the voluntary payment doctrine from attempting collection of any amount still owing from a second responsible party. The Supreme Court found that the Court of Appeals' reasoning in that case was incorrect, and therefore the Court remanded the case for further consideration. View "Georgia Dept. of Revenue v. Moore" on Justia Law

At issue in this case was the constitutionality of an ordinance adopted by the City of Dunwoody that imposed an occupational tax on attorneys who maintained an office and practice law in the city. Appellants argued the ordinance: (1) operated as an unconstitutional precondition on the practice of law, as well as an improper attempt to regulate the practice of law; and (2) violated equal protection requirements because it did not apply to attorneys practicing law outside the city limits. The trial court determined the ordinance was constitutional. Finding no error with the trial court's judgment, the Supreme Court affirmed. View "Moss v. City of Dunwoody" on Justia Law

The issue before the Supreme Court in this case centered on the constitutionality of the Local Option Sales Tax Act ("LOST"), OCGA 48-8-80 et seq., or a provision of it. This case represented the fourth time the matter has come before the Court. The parties to this appeal, and those that have filed amicus curiae briefs, have shown that problems have arisen when the governing entities cannot agree to changes in the distribution formula for purposes of renewing certificates pursuant to the Act. Appellant Turner County and appellees, who are the qualified municipalities within the special taxing district involved in this dispute, reached an impasse in their negotiations for renewing the LOST certificate that authorizes them to collect and distribute tax, which certificate was required to be filed no later than December 30, 2012. Pursuant to the 2010 amendment to the statute, appellee municipalities timely filed a petition with the Turner County Superior Court seeking resolution of the dispute. Turner County filed a motion to dismiss the petition in which it raised various constitutional challenges to the 2010 amendment and its process for submitting the distribution dispute for judicial resolution. The trial court denied Turner County's motion to dismiss and sustained the constitutionality of the 2010 amendment. The court also entered a final order adopting the final and best offer of the municipalities and finding that the municipalities' offer more closely comported with the requirements of the statute and the intent and criteria set forth in the Act. The Supreme Court granted Turner County's application for discretionary appeal to challenge the constitutionality of the 2010 amendment. Upon careful consideration of Turner County's claims of error, the Supreme Court found one dispositive issue: whether the procedure for judicial resolution set forth in OCGA 48-8-89 (d) (4) violated the separation of powers doctrine of the Georgia Constitution of 1983, Art. I, Sec. II, Par. III. The Court concluded this procedure did violate the separation of powers doctrine, and declared that portion of the statute to be void. View "Turner County v. City of Ashburn" on Justia Law

Trip Network, Inc. and several other online travel companies appealed a superior court judgment dismissing their petition for a writ of mandamus. The companies were defendants in a civil suit filed by the City of Atlanta. The City sought to recover hotel-occupancy taxes, but the case was dismissed when the trial court concluded the City did not exhaust its administrative remedies. The City appealed and the Supreme Court reversed. Atlanta then sued the companies in superior court for back taxes and a permanent injunction to require the companies to collect hotel-occupancy taxes from hotel guests. In response to cross-motions for summary judgment, the superior court ordered the injunction and granted summary judgment to the companies on the back taxes issue. As part of the ruling, the Supreme Court found the trial court had not ruled on the City's claim for conversion. Following the issuance of the remittitur, the superior court ordered the parties to brief the court on whether any claims remained pending and how such claims should have been concluded. The companies argued that after the Supreme Court’s earlier ruling, the case was closed, and sought the writ of mandamus to effectively close the case. The Supreme Court concluded that mandamus was not the appropriate remedy for the travel companies to resolve this matter, and that the trial court properly dismissed their petition. View "Trip Network, Inc. v. Dempsey" on Justia Law

Appellants John Sherman and Christopher D. Eichler appealed a trial court’s judgment confirming and validating a bond issuance by the City of Atlanta. At the bond validation hearing, the City successfully disputed Appellants’ standing to become parties and raise objections in this case, because no competent evidence was admitted to show that either Appellant was a Georgia citizen and Atlanta resident, which were the prerequisites to becoming a party under the Revenue Bond Law. Appellants appealed, but the Supreme Court affirmed. View "Sherman v. City of Atlanta" on Justia Law

The trial court in this case ruled that there was no conflict between the 2010 amendment to OCGA 48-5-2 (3) and a 1981 local constitutional amendment providing for the assessment of homestead property in Muscogee County for school and consolidated city-county government taxing purposes. The court further ruled that the 2010 amendment controlled the determination of the fair market value of appellee John Yeoman's recently-purchased homestead property. The Columbus Board of Tax Assessors appeals, but finding no error in the trial court's judgment, the Supreme Court affirmed. View "Columbus Board of Tax Assessors v. Yeoman" on Justia Law

In 1969, the Cities of Atlanta and College Park entered into an agreement for purposes of expanding Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport. One of the provisions of the granted Atlanta the exclusive right to collect and levy occupation taxes from businesses located at the Airport that were within the city limits of College Park. In 2007, after commissioning a study for the purpose of reassessing this relationship, College Park informed Atlanta and Airport businesses that it would no longer honor the 1969 Agreement and that it would seek to collect occupation taxes from the Airport businesses including Atlanta's proprietary business operations. Atlanta filed a declaratory action in seeking a judgment that the 1969 Agreement controlled the collection of occupation taxes from businesses operating at the Airport within College Park. Both Atlanta and College Park moved for partial summary judgment, and, in ruling on the cross motions, the trial court found that Atlanta and College Park's 1969 Agreement was unenforceable. The trial court further ruled that OCGA 48-13-13 (5), which prohibited local governments from levying an occupation tax on any "local authority," precluded College Park from levying an occupation tax on Atlanta's proprietary operations because Atlanta met the definition of a "local authority" under the statute. Both parties appealed, and the Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court's judgment invalidating the 1969 Agreement, but reversed the trial court's finding that the term "local authority" as used in OCGA 48-13-13 (5) included smunicipalities. Upon review, the Supreme Court concluded that the Court of Appeals was correct in its determination that the City of Atlanta was not a "local authority" as that term is used in the statute. View "City of Atlanta v. City of College Park" on Justia Law