Lien on me

By William Kenny
Times Staff Writer

Stanley Brodheim spent 33 years serving the City of Philadelphia as a uniformed beat cop.
But for most of the last year, Brodheim has been trying desperately to get some decent service from the same bureaucracy for which he risked his life for so long.
A litany of apparent administrative ineptitude by the folks in charge of the city’s delinquent property tax accounts has cost Brodheim thousands of dollars and left him shaking his head in frustration and disgust.
First, the city never put his name on the deed of a home he bought, he claims, and it never notified him that he wasn’t paying his full tax bill.
It wasn’t until he went to sell the property almost two decades later that he learned of the debt and of a lien that had been placed on the land.
Then, when he tried to settle the debt, he ended up paying twice the required amount because nobody seemed to keep updated records, he claims.
Early on in the fiasco, Brodheim sought the assistance of a City Council aide with whom he now works at the Franklin Towne Charter High School. But even with the help of Sean McAleer — who recently resigned his staff position with Councilman Jim Kenney (D-at large) to mount his own campaign for City Council — Brodheim continues to grapple with the system in an effort to recoup his losses.
"It’s frustrating. It’s very depressing," he said. "I tried to do the right thing and made all of the proper phone calls. I went to court and kept continuing it. I just feel that the money’s gone and they’re never going to give in.
"I’m very disgusted and I want to move out of the city, but I can’t because I’m on a fixed income," he added.

••

Stanley Brodheim’s problems all started with a dream, the American Dream, in fact.
He had never owned a home. Even after more than 15 years on the police force, mostly patrolling the streets of Center City, he and his wife at the time were still renting a place for themselves and three children. In 1987, they decided it was time to buy.
They settled on a modest rowhome on the 4600 block of Kraydor St. in Upper Holmesburg, less than a block from Torresdale Avenue and the old Holmesburg Prison.
They paid $41,000 for the house and an extra bit of land at the rear, across the street from Pennypack Park. Because the back yard fronted a city street, it had — and still has — a separate address. It’s on the 4600 block of Enfield Ave.
That’s the way it was when Brodheim bought it in 1987, and the way it was when he sold the place last May for $80,000.
Both addresses were listed on his mortgage papers with the Police and Fire Federal Credit Union. Brodheim set up the property taxes to be included in his loan payments. They were deducted automatically each month from his account with the credit union, which held the deed.
He assumed that down at City Hall, the revenue folks would surely know where to go when tax time rolled around. He was wrong.
According to McAleer, the city’s Department of Records updated the Kraydor Street address with Brodheim’s name, but it never changed the name on the Enfield Avenue address. So, while Brodheim was paying about $1,100 each year in taxes for his home, he never got billed for the empty back yard.
At about 1,200 square feet, the rear lot’s annual assessment was about $100.
In retrospect, Brodheim figures that the bills went out to the previous owner. He recalls receiving some mail addressed to the woman for a year or so, but he returned it unopened to the post office.
The Northeast Times attempted to contact several officials in the city’s Department of Records, including Commissioner Joan T. Decker, but nobody responded to requests for an explanation.

••

In researching the issue last year, McAleer went to the city’s own online property tax database and saw that the Enfield Avenue property still had the previous owner’s name listed.
Both addresses now have the name of the man who bought them from Brodheim, who was oblivious to the obvious error for 19 years. He even re-mortgaged the property twice through the credit union, but nobody ever discovered the discrepancy.
The head of the credit union’s loan department, Joe Motz, told the Times that delinquent taxes generally would show up on a property search at the time of refinancing. But he refused to comment on Brodheim’s account, citing privacy issues.
Brodheim learned of the lien in April 2006, when he was about to sell the property.
"All those years, I thought I was fine," he said. "My Realtor, he contacted me as we were about to go to settlement. He said there was all kinds of back taxes and we had to take care of it."
"At the time," noted McAleer, "they said they couldn’t go through with the sale unless we got this back lien settled."
Since then, Brodheim has never disputed that he owed some back taxes. He was perfectly willing to pay the principal on them, roughly $2,500 over the 19 years.
Problem was, the city claimed he owed more than twice that much because of penalties and interest. Actually, the city held only the newest part of the debt. In 1997, the administration of then-Mayor Ed Rendell sold the older debt to a law firm specializing in government collections.
Texas-based Linebarger Goggan Blair & Sampson acquired all of the city’s delinquent property tax liens prior to 1997.
Linebarger said that Brodheim owed $3,456 for tax years 1988 to 1996. The city said Brodheim owed an additional $1,991 for 1997 to 2004.
Brodheim opted to appeal to the city’s Tax Review Board to have the penalties and interest removed.
For the property sale to occur, however, he was forced to shell out $5,000 to an escrow account, with his real estate agent contributing another $1,500, to cover the outstanding tax debt pending the appeal.
Unknown to Brodheim, at the time of the sale, the title company handling the transaction wrote out three checks totaling $2,321 to Wachovia Bank, which served as trustee for the lien.
Those checks cleared in June 2006. But more than four months later, Brodheim still hadn’t received credit for the payments, he claims.

••

After two postponements, Brodheim and attorneys for both the city and Linebarger finally got together for a Tax Review Board hearing on Oct. 30. That day, a hearing officer ruled that Brodheim should pay the delinquent tax principal and attorneys fees, but not penalties or interest — or so Brodheim understood.
The hearing officer told Brodheim to wait for a notice in the mail telling him how much he owed. Once he paid the bills, the lien would be removed from the property and he would receive the balance of the money he had placed in the escrow account.
At the time, according to McAleer, the city attorney at the hearing reported that the city hadn’t been paid to date, despite the checks from the title company that had been cashed in June.
Brodheim received the new bills in mid-November. Short on cash at the time, he took out a $3,000 personal loan to cover everything. McAleer personally delivered Brodheim’s checks to each agency. They were dated on Nov. 21.
One check, for $1,017, went to Linebarger. It cleared on Nov. 27. Another, for $1,314, went to the City of Philadelphia. It cleared on Nov. 24.
Brodheim and McAleer then began the process of trying to recoup the escrow money.
The title company said it couldn’t release the money until the liens had been removed. McAleer spoke to an official with the city’s Department of Revenue who reported that Brodheim still hadn’t been credited with any payments.
The city official explained that all revenue on delinquent taxes first goes to Linebarger, regardless of whose name is on the check. The collection firm then takes out its share before the city can dip into the pot.
Drew Aldinger, a partner in the collection firm, told the Times that under the terms of the 1997 tax-lien transfer, older debt generally gets paid first. Linebarger owns the older debt.
So, the lien was still on the property weeks after the bills had been paid for the second time, according to McAleer.
"It was just total frustration. Nobody knew what the other one was doing," he said.
Soon after, Brodheim received a letter from the title company threatening to give the remaining escrow money to the city because the lien was still on the property. That did not occur.

••

The title company finally released the escrow-account funds last month, leading McAleer to believe that the lien had been removed. Brodheim got a check for about $2,500 on March 7 — about half of what he had put into the account — while his real estate agent got back all of his $1,500.
Now Brodheim’s trying to get back another $2,300-plus. That’s the money initially taken out of the escrow account in June when he sold his house.
He and McAleer know the check was cashed, but they don’t believe any of the money went toward his tax debt.
McAleer continues to correspond with Linebarger over the issue. Aldinger, the firm’s partner, told the Times that he spoke to McAleer last week.
"He’s satisfied with the progress we’re making," Aldinger said.
McAleer disagrees.
"I didn’t say I was satisfied with the progress," he retorted.
There seems to be one final point of contention.
McAleer, a Democrat who hopes to unseat longtime Republican Councilman Brian O’Neill in this year’s election, believes that a clerk for the Tax Review Board who prepared the printed version of the hearing officer’s Oct. 30 ruling made a key error. Instead of absolving Brodheim of penalties and interest from 1988 through 2005, the written order is dated only for 1995 through 2005.
The written order, as is, does not reflect the hearing testimony, McAleer claims. Besides that, it makes no sense. The Jan. 1, 1995 cutoff would allow Linebarger to collect penalties and interest for 1988 through 1994, but not for 1995 and 1996.
"So now we have to go get the notes of testimony (from the hearing)," McAleer said.
That process is underway. Linebarger has refused to concede that Brodheim should be exempt from penalties and interest dating back to 1988.
"I don’t know what good it’s going to do," Brodheim said. "They’re standing pat and making me prove everything now." ••
Reporter William Kenny can be reached at 215-354-3031 or bkenny@phillynews.com