There was a process and the city followed it. Just because a group with wealth and power don't like that outcome doesn't mean it should be changed. They bought it fair and square and, to believe them because I have no reason not to, they didn't do ti with any sort of malice.
The suit against them by the homeowners seems entirely punitive and particularly harassing. Their issue is whether the city followed the process. If they are that concerned with fixing what is very obviously the screw up of an organization they fully own and run then they can pay to do so.
I'm ok with some karma for the deliquent homeowners, but I see no reason why this should turn into a giant cash prize for a private citizen.
I have noticed that people who support the buyers tend to point out the problem with wealthy and powerful people getting special treatment. I'm against that, but it doesn't remove my distaste for making money this way.
What did the buyers do that’s so awful? As far as I know, they were going to charge a reasonable rate for parking to cover maintenance and their $90,000 purchase price. It’s not like they were going to start charging a toll or something. They wouldn’t be legally able to anyway. Nobody was being forced to pay the buyers anything, they just had the option of paying to park.
What would you say should have happened here? I don’t see what else you could do with this land if you bought it. If the city didn’t auction it off, then why would anyone ever pay their taxes again?
It's clear that we disagree about the nature of this tax bill, why it wasn't paid, and whether it's appropriate for the government auction off private property under these circumstances.
The strongest argument I've read here on HN is that if the wealthy and powerful don't experience the injustice of their own laws, they won't change them - and that less connected and wealthy residents would not have gotten a similar rescue from government.
I’ll ask again, what do you think should have happened here? Auctioning off delinquent property isn’t great, but I have trouble coming up with something better.
OK, ok, you're asking, what should have happened, not what shouldn't have happened. I can't say it's a totally unfair question. It probably would be worth thinking this through.
But overall, I don't really feel like I need to propose a new a system for collecting minuscule delinquent property tax bills that doesn't involve selling off massively valuable property at auction to point out that this is a really bad and completely unnecessary outcome. Guess that's so obvious to me that I just don't feel inclined to engage with the question.
For what, buying land that legally went up for sale when a laughably low tax went unpaid for 40 years? If this had happened anywhere else to people other than the ultra-rich, nobody would care and they'd be allowed to own it. This is nothing more than a demonstration of America being ruled by the whims of oligarchy rather than law.
Defective service is defective service. The tax bill was being being returned every year and the city made no meaningful attempt to contact the property owner before auctioning off the property.
The same result would have happened with anyone who could afford an attorney to pursue rescission of the sale.
There was a process and the city followed it. Just because a group with wealth and power don't like that outcome doesn't mean it should be changed. They bought it fair and square and, to believe them because I have no reason not to, they didn't do ti with any sort of malice.
The suit against them by the homeowners seems entirely punitive and particularly harassing. Their issue is whether the city followed the process. If they are that concerned with fixing what is very obviously the screw up of an organization they fully own and run then they can pay to do so.