Lane County Assessor v Briggs

Management of the west Eugene wetlands is done through Wetland Executive Team (WET) a partnership

between the City of Eugene, the Bureau of Land Management, and The Nature Conservancy. The Statement of Partnership beginning this relationship was signed on March 11, 1994, and continues in effect through this day. A subsequent Memorandum of Agreement, made on June 13, 1995, further delineated the authority of the Bureau of Land Management to act for the City of Eugene [**2] and The Nature Conservancy. On December 29, 1999, Mr. Briggs donated a conservation easement to the Bureau of Land Management. As part of this process, a summary appraisal report was commissioned and submitted to the U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Land Management, and Mr. Briggs. This report found the market value of the property, as held in fee simple title, to be $ 40,000. An allocation of the interests conveyed found the rights embodied in the conservation easement to be worth $ 38,000. The reserved rights retained by Mr. Briggs were estimated at $ 2,000. The date of the report was April 14, 2000, for a valuation date as of December 29, 1999, the day of donation. The board of property tax appeals, after considering these facts, chose to reduce the real market value of Mr. Briggs' property to $ 2,000. [*89] Through this appeal Lane County seeks to have its value increased to $36,797.