Blunt (Property Tax) Assessment: Five Years of Tax Breaks

In this morning's KC Star:

Records show [U.S. Rep. Roy Blunt] from Springfield, who is running for U.S. Senate, may have erroneously received a homestead exemption for a $1.6 million residence in Georgetown.

District of Columbia law allows a residential property owner — in this case, Blunt’s wife, Abigail — to deduct $67,500 from the assessed value of a home if it serves as the owner’s primary residence...

Records show the district also applied what’s called a tax assessment credit to the property, which caps the growth of taxes owed on the home. If the district determines that credit was improperly used, the Blunts’ potential back tax liability could go up.

The article also states that Blunt asked DC Councilman Jack Evans to fix the issue in "early 2004."  I know that Blunt has a hard time imagining what it's like for regular folks, but when normal people need to cancel their homestead tax deduction, they don't ask a DC Councilperson. They just fill out this one-page form that's very easy to find at www.dc.gov, and mail it in.  Problem solved!

And before the Blunt's get all indignant about how hard it is navigate the DC government, they should remember that the details for canceling the Homestead Deduction and any other tax benefits would have been printed on every property tax assessment they received since "early 2004."

We look forward to seeing how this is all the fault of the DC government, and how the Blunt's were prevented from fixing this situation in any of the past five years.