Session Laws

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General Court assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:

SECTION 1. Section 24B of chapter 36 of the General Laws, as appearing in the 1984 Official Edition, is hereby amended by adding the following paragraph:-

Said register or said assistant recorder shall require from each person who appears before him to record a deed to real property, such information as is determined by the commissioner of revenue to be necessary for the purpose of executing the duties required by section ten of chapter fifty-eight. The information shall be collected on a form approved by the commissioner. A copy of each completed form shall be forwarded to the commissioner of revenue and to the board of assessors in the city or town where the property lies.

SECTION 2. Section 7 of chapter 58A of the General Laws, as so appearing, is hereby amended by adding the following paragraph:-

In the case of an appeal relating to the property classified as residential greater than eight units, commercial or industrial, that are assessed for more than two hundred thousand dollars in the previous fiscal year upon a motion filed by the appellee and granted by the appellate tax board, the appellant shall file with the said board an audited income and expense statement for the most recent year within forty days from the date of taking the appeal.

SECTION 3. Section 8A of said chapter 58A, as so appearing, is hereby amended by adding the following sentence:- At least thirty days prior to the hearing of a petition for the abatement of a tax, upon a motion filed by either party and granted by the appellate tax board, the appellant and appellee shall exchange appraisal reports containing such information about the property as the appellate tax board adjudges necessary.

SECTION 4. Section 38D of chapter 59 of the General Laws, as so appearing, is hereby amended by adding the following paragraph:-

If an owner or lessee of real property fails to submit such information within the time and in the form prescribed, in addition to any other penalties, there shall be added to the real property tax levied upon the property in question for the next ensuing tax year the amount of fifty dollars; provided, however, that the board of assessors informed said owner or lessee that failure to so submit such information would result in said penalty.

SECTION 5. Said chapter 59 is hereby further amended by inserting after section 38E, as so appearing, the following two sections:-

Section 38F. A board of assessors may request the owner or lessee of any personal property to make a written return under oath within sixty days containing such information as may reasonably be required by it to determine the actual fair cash valuation of such property.

Failure of an owner or lessee of personal property to comply with such request within sixty days after it has been made shall bar him from any statutory appeal under this chapter, unless such owner or lessee was unable to comply with such request for reasons beyond his control. If any owner or lessee of personal property in a return made under this section makes any statement which he knows to be false in a material particular, such false statement shall bar him from any statutory appeal under this chapter.

Section 38G. A board of assessors may require testimony under oath of a taxpayer relative to his written return filed under section thirty-eight F and may also require testimony under oath of any applicant for abatement under section fifty-nine.

SECTION 6. Said chapter 59, as so appearing, is hereby further amended by inserting after section 52A the following two sections:-

Section 52B. All information collected pursuant to sections thirty-eight D, thirty-eight E and sixty-one A of chapter fifty-nine and section eight A of chapter fifty-eight A shall be open to the inspection of the assessors, the commissioner, the deputies, clerks and assistants of either the assessors or the commissioner and such other officials of the commonwealth or of its political subdivisions who have occasion to inspect such information in the performance of their official duties, but to no other person except by order of the appellate tax board or a court, except that if the assessor bases a valuation of an assessed owner's real or personal property, in whole or in part, on a comparable sale, or sales, the assessor shall provide any market data relating to such comparable sale or sales to the assessed owner of the property or his designated representative upon request.

Section 52C. The provisions of section ten of chapter sixty-six shall not be deemed to authorize public access to terminals or other data processing equipment for the purpose of copying, reading, collecting, printing, analyzing or manipulating any data or other information collected under any provision of this chapter and stored in data processing or computing equipment or to authorize the release of the original or copies of tapes, cards, disc files or other methods of electronic storage of such data or information, unless authorized by the commissioner of revenue.

Nothing contained in this section shall restrict the right of a person assessed or his designated representative to inspect at the assessor's office information and records relating to the valuation and assessment of his property or to receive copies of this information.

SECTION 7. Section one of this act shall take effect on January first, nineteen hundred and eighty-seven.