Class Action Complaint filed against Duval County Property Appraiser

Blanchard, et al. v. Overton Complaint with Exhibits

On July 9, 2010, the Firm filed a class action complaint against Jim Overton in his official capacity as Property Appraiser for Duval County, Florida. The Complaint in Blanchard, et al. v. Overton, in the Circuit Court of the Fourth Judicial Circuit in and for Duval County, Florida, seeks declaratory and injunctive relief against the Property Appraiser for the illegal actions taken by his office when it placed following language on the data collection card obtainable from the Property Appraiser’s website regarding the Plaintiffs and the proposed class members’ real property: “THERE ARE OR MAY BE HAZARDOUS SUBSTANCES ON THE PROPERTY FOR MORE INFORMATION PLEASE CALL 904-630-CITY” (the “Unlawful Notation”). Because there was no ordinance directing Mr. Overton to place this information on the Property Appraiser’s website, he was acting outside his authority granted by the Charter of the City of Jacksonville. Mr. Overton will likely rely upon a consent decree entered into by the City and U.S. Government through the EPA as mandating the unlawful action. The Consent Decree addresses the City’s remediation of the hazardous waste it created when operating incinerators of municipal waste and a dump site for the disposal of the ash from the 1910s through approximately 1960. However, as shown by the Complaint, the Consent Decree required the City to enact an ordinance directing the Property Appraiser’s actions and only required the Unlawful Notation to be placed on properties within a defined area. The proposed class encompasses all owners of real property outside the defined Site boundaries whose data collection card has been tagged with the Unlawful Notation because the number of properties tagged by the Property Appraiser is well beyond the requirements of the consent decree itself. The lawsuit seeks to have the actions of Mr. Overton declared illegal and in violation of the Charter of the City of Jacksonville and to have the information removed. Additional damages may also be sought against the Property Appraiser as a result of the stigma which was improperly placed on the affected properties. There are certain persons and entities excluded from the proposed class as a result of a prior lawsuit against the City and others related to the incinerator sites. The Complaint was recently served on the Property Appraiser and no response has been filed to date.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 21st, 2010 at 1:51 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.