Election day color: on the ground during the Winston-Salem municipal primary

South Ward candidate Carolyn Highsmith greets voter Ben Marsh.

Carolyn Highsmith, the challenger in the Democratic primary, took off her name badge and went in the polling place at Philo-Hill Middle School to find out how many people had voted.

The tally was 17, and it was already about 10:15 a.m.

"If we're not going get any better than this, we're not going to get anywhere," Highsmith said.

Closer to downtown at Diggs-Latham Elementary School, Clevetta Gilliam, a campaign worker for Mayor Allen Joines was working the polls for her candidate, while encouraging voters to pull the lever for Molly Leight, the incumbent South Ward representative and Highsmith's opponent.

She found a receptive audience with Doug Lewis and his wife.

"Are you considering voting for Allen Joines?" Gilliam asked.

"Oh yes," the Lewises responded.

"And Molly Leight in the South Ward?"

"For sure."

Doug Lewis said he worked with Joines as a representative of the arts council in the early 1970s on the renovation of the Sawtooth School of Visual Arts and development of Winston Square Park. Joines worked for the city at the time.

It was natural for Lewis to also support Leight, a fellow resident of the Washington Park neighborhood.

"She's a responsive representative," he said. "She's well liked. She listens well. She returns calls."

Four years ago, the precinct at Diggs-Latham Elementary School had the highest turnout in the South Ward primary and gave Leight her largest share of votes.

The total number of votes cast on election day in the precinct during the 2009 primary was 129. By 10:15 a.m. today, only 27 people had voted.

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Voter turnout has been strong across the Northeast Ward, where two well qualified challengers, Brenda Diggs and Jemmise Bowen, are seeking to unseat Vivian Burke, who has held the seat since 1977.

At John Wesley AME Zion Church, a precinct that serves the area near the LaDeara Crest public housing community, the vote total after lunch tallied at 46 — nearly twice the total for the entire day during the 2009 primary.

Similarly, at Carver High School, 89 votes had been cast, compared to 70 for the entire day in 2009.

And at the Mazie Woodruff Center — the Northeast Ward's busiest precinct — 115 votes had been cast by 12:30 p.m., besting the day-long total of 92 in 2009.

"No comparison," said Mildred Strange, an election judge for the precinct.

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Allen Joines' campaign workers, dressed in blue T-shirts, have been ubiquitous at polling stations across the city today, and not just in the Northeast, East, Southeast, Northwest and South Wards, where contested primaries for ward seats are likely to drive the turnout of Democratic and unaffiliated voters who can vote for the Democratic mayor. Joines has also had campaign workers in West Ward precincts such as First Christian Church and Calvary Baptist Church, where the only other race on the ballot is a Republican primary for the ward representative.

Steve Strawsburg, one of Joines' three campaign co-chairs, was working the polling place outside of First Christian Church.

"We're going to get a solid turnout for a contested Democratic primary," he said. "That's why we're here — to talk to voters."

That was an easy sell with Sam Owen, a former head of the city's information systems department, who was a colleague of Joines when the mayor worked for the city.

"He's a very competent person," Owen said. "I think he's done an excellent job as mayor.

"He represents the city well," Owen added. "When I see him up there I have confidence in the city. We're going in the right direction. Good things are happening."

Not everyone was following the mayor's song sheet.

Spencer Drummond, who rode his bicycle to First Christian Church, said he wants to see change.

"When people have been in there too long, everybody has to get through them to get around them," he said. "That helps create a problem. I even feel that way about Supreme Court justices.

Drummond said he has been passing out fliers for Gardenia Henley, Joines' challenger in the mayoral primary for five months.

"Nothing changes if you don't vote to make a change," he said.

Steve Strawsburg greets a voter outside of First Christian Church.

***

Forsyth County Elections Director said turnout overall has been light, although it has been "a little higher in the Northwest Ward," where three candidates — Jeff MacIntosh, Noah Reynolds and Laura Elliott — are competing in the Democratic primary to replace Councilwoman Wanda Merschel, who announced earlier this year that she would not seek an another term.

Coffman predicted turnout for the primary will fall in the range of 6 to 10 percent. In comparison, less than 4 percent of registered voters took part in the 2009 municipal primary.

Early voting nearly tripled from 2009 to 2013, from about 700 to 2,400 votes.

Forsyth tax review board adjusts values in second Winston-Salem neighborhood

A Forsyth County board tasked with hearing appeals to property tax valuations approved mass changes to a second neighborhood on Friday before officially adjourning.

The board of equalization and review unanimously approved a recommendation by the tax office to make upwards adjustments to values in Castleshire, an affluent African-American neighborhood adjacent to Winston Lake Golf Course in a sequel to a similar decision last week to make blanket changes in Monticello Park.

The neighborhood stood out because there were no sales from 2009 onward that assessors could use to set values. Tax Assessor John Burgiss said staff decided to make an adjustment across the neighborhood based on changes approved in individual appeals. Staff was challenged by the fact that there are few similar properties in adjacent neighborhood and had to select comparable sales from across the county.

"This represents an extreme degree of difficulty," Burgiss said. "I was searching countywide, which is something we would normally not want to do. I looked at the comps and then we looked at the result of the appeals. Based on that, we made the decision to start from scratch."

The adjustment in Castleshire brings the total amount of value restored through blanket changes to $3.7 million, in addition to almost $1 million from individual appeals by property owners across the east side of Winston-Salem.

The neighborhood is home to several prominent Winston-Salem citizens, including Contract Office Furnishings owner Thomas Trollinger and Chronicle publisher Ernest H. Pitt.

The mass change approved by the board restored $1.2 million in valuation in aggregate to 110 properties in Castleshire, increasing their values by an average of 6.9 percent. The initial revaluation knocked off an average of 21.2 percent of values in the neighborhood, with the approved changes blunting the reduction to 17.3 percent. In contrast, many neighborhoods on the east side and parts of the south side of Winston-Salem lost more than 50 percent of value, and some, such as Castle Heights, hemorrhaged by as much as 75 percent.

Monticello Park, the first neighborhood subject to mass adjustment by the board, is also an upscale black community on the east side, but comparisons end there. Properties in Monticello Park lost 70 percent of value on average in the initial reappraisal. The board's vote to implement mass changes in part of the neighborhood restored $2.5 million in value and whittled the loss experienced by the affected properties down from 46.6 percent to 14.9 percent.

The mass changes in Castleshire did not affect one influential resident, Forsyth County Commissioner Walter Marshall, who represents District A. His home on Kittering Lane dropped in value from $220,800 in 2009 to $200,800 in 2013.

Community leaders from across Winston-Salem who attended the hearing expressed mixed feelings about the board's action.

Carolyn Highsmith, president of the Konnoak Hills Community Association, said she was disappointed that the board did not make any adjustments in a section of her neighborhood where staff acknowledged that a flawed sales comp potentially caused upwards of 100 properties to be undervalued my more than 5 percent.

A racially diverse and mixed income area, the Konnoak Hills area is located on the south side of the city. Highsmith worked with the Ministers Conference of Winston-Salem and Vicinity to help property owners file appeals both to bring relief on an individual basis and encourage the board to take a second look and consider mass changes. Burgiss said the tax office received more than 1,500 appeals in the last few days.

Highsmith said Vice Chair David Shaw did not respond to an e-mailed request for the board to correct values in the affected section of her neighborhood, identified by the tax office as Anderleigh.

"I think the issue is still out there," she said. "They addressed it as minimally as they had to. They have done their job according to the statute, but is what benefits the community the most? I don't think so.

"They've built in the inequity because they changed the highest valued neighborhoods," Highsmith added. "The most motivated neighborhoods appeal. What about the neighborhoods where people didn't get their appeals in because they were taking care of someone who was sick or there was a death in the family? Or they're just trying to get by and they're too busy making ends meet to get their appeal in?"

Burgiss said notices of adjustments were not sent out to Monticello Park residents until Wednesday and that he expects some push-back. Affected property owners will have 15 days from the time they receive their new notices to appeal.

Burgiss also said the tax office received a request from the West Salem Neighborhood Association to consider making global changes to values in the neighborhood, but after reviewing staff's methodology he did not think any changes were warranted.

Friday marked the statutory deadline for mass changes. The board will continue to meet to hear individual appeals.

"Today's the day we need to all feel comfortable," Shaw remarked before accepting a motion to adjourn.

The board also voted in a unanimous decision to allow board member William V. White to bring a report for consideration that would be submitted to the Forsyth County Commission.

"It would talk about the assessment process in a catastrophically changing market," White said. "It would talk about briefly the assessor's outreach efforts during the informal appeals, including public meetings. It would summarize very briefly some of the public concerns. It would talk about in summary fashion some of the neighborhoods that had areas of concern, the county assessor's recommendation that two of those areas be changed, talk about the appeal process, and it would conclude the finding of fact that we followed the statutory provisions all the way through and that mass changes otherwise would have been in violation [of state statute], and basically state that we believe the assessor's office did a good job."

Burgiss said the 2013 reappraisal has been challenging for citizens, staff and the board alike.

"So I appreciate your interest in and looking into what the reappraisal was all about and trying to help us make sure that we have equitable values for all our citizens," he told board members. "I realize that this puts you in a more unique position than has been exercised in the past."

The 2013 Forysth County tax revaluation was the subject of a two-part investigative report published jointly by YES! Weekly and Camel City Dispatch.

Movement to preserve values east-side neighborhoods springs back to life

Virginia K. Newell and John Burgiss

Carolyn Highsmith, president of the Konnoak Hills Community Association, received a boost from the Ministers Conference of Winston-Salem & Vicinity in her quest to build pressure on the county to revise property assessments that drastically reduced values in predominantly black and Hispanic neighborhoods along the eastern rim of the city.

The Ministers Conference rallied residents in a press conference that highlighted homeowners who have experienced substantial markdowns in neighborhoods such as Slater Park and Skyland Park.

The Rev. Willard Bass, president of the Ministers Conference, said he believes the process used by the Forsyth County Tax Department to assess values for neighborhoods that have seen significant reductions in value is flawed, but could not point to a specific cause.

"I think the flaw is there," he said. "We want to know what the matrix is." He added that the tax department should not have used the same approach as it did in the 2009 revaluation, considering that the housing market has demonstrated a significant degree of instability since then.  


Highsmith suggested the decrease in property values found in Forsyth County Commission District A, which covers an urban area of Winston-Salem whose voters are primarily African-American and Hispanic Democrats, might constitute a 21st-century version of redlining. The term refers to a practice by banks in the 1960s to draw a line around certain African-American neighborhoods where they refused to loan capital.

"In 2013, community leaders in county commissioner voting District A are questioning whether their neighborhoods are being devalued so that large real estate developers at a later date can sweep in and buy up these devalued properties at rock-bottom prices," Highsmith said, "or that city and county governments in the upcoming years will not have to pay the actual market price as re-development projects such as major road changes and downtown gentrification projects continue to push east from downtown Winston-Salem."

The press conference took on surreal feel as Virginia K. Newell, a former Winston-Salem councilwoman, railed against the reduction in her property's tax assessment as Tax Assessor John Burgiss sat nearby and listened. Organizers of the press conference did not publicly acknowledge Burgiss or invite him to respond to various complaints, including that staff in his office used grades to arbitrarily reduce values in certain neighborhoods, relied on incorrect square footage figures and passed up the opportunity to inspect the inside of houses that are under appeal.

Community leaders expressed dismay that members of the Forsyth County Board of Equalization and Review said they believe the tax department did a good job on the reappraisal overall, and that they do not see a need for blanket changes to neighborhoods valuations. The board is charged with hearing appeals from property owners who believe that their valuations and incorrect, and has the power to make blanket changes across entire neighborhoods. The community leaders called for the 2013 tax revaluation to be set aside and for an outside firm to come in and review the process used to obtain values.

"We've lost confidence in the system," Bass said. "We'd like to have integrity returned to the system. We hope that the questions we've raised will leave the door open for the some justice and equity."

In the meantime, organizers are urging property owners to file individual appeals, both to address the problem on an individual level and to let members of the board of equalization know that there are systemic issues with how the revaluation was completed. Bass urged audience members to help get the word out that volunteers will be on hand at local libraries this weekend to help property owners file appeals.

Newell said some of her neighbors in Skyland Park are happy with their valuations because their tax bills will be reduced.
  
"But I don't feel that way," Newell said, "because if my property were to be sold I would have spent a lot of money and invested in it and then it's gone. And I don't think people understand that. Because if the houses on Pickford Court and that area [in Newell's neighborhood] are not raised the way we think we have improved them, then my property — though it might sell — it would still not be worth what we have put into it — the investment. And basically property, for poor people, your home is about the only thing you've got with any amount to leave to your legacy — your family and your children. And if you take that away, what's left?"

Forsyth County tax panel will not meet with residents in community

A volunteer board appointed to hear appeals to property tax valuations in Forsyth County reversed position on May 30 when members said they are no longer interested in scheduling a meeting in the community to hear directly from residents in neighborhoods affected by plunging home values.

The decision angered Joycelyn Johnson, a Skyland Park resident and community leader who is running for Winston-Salem City Council. Johnson had also asked members of the Forsyth County Board of Equalization and Review to personally visit homes in affected neighborhoods that have lost as much as 70 percent of their appraised value to see firsthand their quality of upkeep.

Johnson and Tax Assessor John Burgiss engaged in a heated discussion about economic-functional obsolescence, an instrument the appraisers in the tax office use to reconcile a cost-based assessment of what properties are worth with market activity.

  

“That’s the institutional problem you have — is you have neighborhoods with economic-functional obsolescence of 75 percent. When you tell me my home is only 25 percent functional, you’re devaluing my neighborhood. I doubt very seriously that any of you have. I doubt very seriously that any of you lost more than 50 percent of the value of your house.”

Johnson was one of only three members of the public who attended the meeting. Since the board convened in early May, its meetings have been poorly attended, in contrast to mass meetings held in churches by the Ministers Conference of Winston-Salem & Vicinity, the Rev. Paul Lowe and Winston-Salem Councilman Derwin Montgomery in March when residents first received notification of their assessments.

“System-wide you have certain neighborhoods where you had no sales, or you had foreclosures, or you had few sales nearby,” said Carolyn Highsmith, president of the Konnoak Hills Community Association. “It feels like you’re penalizing 115 or 215 properties in an entire neighborhood. I think the data points are too small for the samples to devalue hundreds of parcels.”

Chairman Richard N. Davis, who has been the most vocal advocate for addressing neighborhood-wide complaints on the board, was not present for the meeting. Board member Marybeth Abdow was also absent.

Vice Chairman David Shaw said he believes the best way to address any perceived problems is to submit evidence of any errors through individual appeals.

Burgiss said the tax department has received no information to indicate any “widespread data problems.”

The board has scheduled two additional meetings, on June 13 and June 20, before it is statutorily required to make any blanket changes to neighborhood valuations on June 28. On Thursday, June 13, the board will begin hearing individual appeals from property owners in Monticello Park and other neighborhoods under scrutiny because of severe reductions in values.