City brought suit against real estate developer seeking to have developer’s real estate sold in order to collect outstanding payments for delinquent real estate taxes and special assessments. The Circuit Court entered decree of sale. Developer appealed.
The Supreme Court of Virginia held that:
- City had no authority to bring suit to sell the real estate as a means to collect delinquent real estate taxes;
- City had no authority to bring suit to sell the real estate as a means to collect delinquent special taxes; and
- City had no authority to bring suit to sell the real estate as a means to collect delinquent special assessments.
Because city did not strictly comply with time period in tax code allowing for a suit to sell real estate to be brought, the city had no authority under the code to bring suit to sell taxpayer’s real estate as a means to collect delinquent real estate taxes.
Because city did not strictly comply with the time period in tax code allowing for a suit to sell real estate to be brought, and had not adopted an ordinance pursuant to code provision allowing for it to expedite and collect delinquent special taxes independent from its collection of another type of delinquent “locality’s taxes,” the city had no authority under the code to bring suit to sell taxpayer’s real estate as a means to collect delinquent special taxes.
Because city had not shown that it had strictly complied with tax code provisions allowing for it to bring suit to collect delinquent special assessments on behalf of a community development authority, the city did not establish authority under the code to bring suit to sell taxpayer’s real estate as a means to collect the delinquent special assessments.