The City of Beaumont is charging Mello Roos Services Tax on each of Heartland’s Parcels totaling $300,000.
Heartland Area 5
The property owners of Heartland Area 5 joined with other property owners in 1994 to acquire Mello Roos Bond Debt to finance their housing developments. Heartland was scheduled to build 1,000 houses and was responsible for $2,345,669 of the $10,290,000 1994 Bond.
The 1994 Bond appraised Area 5 for $11.7 Million and was scheduled to build all 1,000 house by 2005. Area 5 remains a barren wasteland.
The City of Beaumont is charging Heartland Area 5 a total of $300,000 in Mello Roos Services Tax on their parcels. Not only does the City charge property owners additional fees for services like fire protection and parks in the bathroom; they are charging a Services Tax for each of the 1,000 houses in Area 5 that were never built.
The address on each of the property tax assessments is “1271 Avenue of the Americas 39th Floor, New York, NY, 10020.”
The City has released an accounting of $5.2 Million of the $10,290,000 acquired from the 1994 Bond. Unfortunately the document released by the City does not correspond with the 1994 Bond Requisitions. To Date the 1994 Bond Requisitions Report the following:
The Law Firm of Aklufi Wysocki was paid $296,828.90 from the 1994 Bond while holding the title of Beaumont City Attorney.
William K. Aylward CPA paid himself $179,779.07 from the 1994 Bond while holding the title of Beaumont Finance Director.
The City of Beaumont transferred to itself a total of $434,776.52 from the 1994 Bond, not $65,000 as reported by the City.
Heartland was reimbursed $91,200.00 from the 1994 bond for “4th Street Construction Management.”
It is unknown what Beaumont Elected and Appointed Officials did with Area 5’s bond money, but it’s all gone now and the phantom property owners of Area 5 are responsible for their bond debt.
Developers want to build in Beaumont because the City was illegally using Mello Roos Bond Debt to pay Developer Mitigation Fees, which pushes the developers’ mitigation fee onto ‘future’ property owners. Mello Roos Bonds can not be used to pay Mitigation Fees.
The Water District is correct to require Area 5 Developers to pay Mitigation Fees, but both the District and the Developer must accept the fact that the City of Beaumont can not longer promise Mello Roos Bond Debt in exchange for mitigation fees.