Dec. 29, 2008 — The beginning of the new year will usher in some changes at the Lieutenant Governor's Office, with Roy L. Martin retiring from his post as the territory's tax assessor — a job he's held for almost a decade.
In 1969 Martin started working in the Tax Assessor's Office — a division of the Lieutenant Governor's Office — coming on as an assistant appraiser. Over the next 40 years, he rose through the ranks, serving as a land appraiser, deputy tax assessor and assistant tax assessor before taking control of the office in January 1999.
Though the office "weathered many challenges" over the past 10 years, there were still many highlights, Martin said in a statement Monday.
"I was privileged to be part of a team that worked hard to complete the District Court-mandated revaluation project, and implement a state-of-the-art valuation system and collection software," he said.
Martin took over the helm of the Tax Assessor's Office the year before a group of commercial-property owners hit the government with a lawsuit that challenged the method of assessing commercial properties. In 2003 the court ordered the government to conduct a thorough revaluation of all commercial and residential properties — a process that prevented the government from issuing property-tax bills for 2006 and 2007, since property-tax values were frozen at 1998 levels until the project was complete and a new assessment system put in place.
The court battle continues: The government most recently appealed a contempt order issued by District Court Judge Curtis Gomez, and is currently waiting on a decision from the U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals. But the Tax Assessor's Office does have a few tools in place to move the process forward once the property-tax issues get resolved. Congress' recent decision to repeal a 1936 federal statute that prevented the V.I. government from taxing real property at different rates, regardless of its classification or use, led to the approval of a new multi-rate property tax system the governor signed into law a few months ago. Meanwhile, the Tax Assessor's Office has been digitizing all its registered survey and tax maps, which help give employees easy access to property information, including roadway system and topography maps, Martin said recently.
"The people of this territory have benefited from Mr. Martin's service, knowledge and expertise for nearly 40 years," Lt. Gov. Gregory R. Francis said in Monday's release. "I appreciate his dedication to the Tax Assessor's Office, and his hard work and guidance through the many phases of growth that were needed to improve the customer-service product that we offer to the community. I thank him for his service, and offer my very best wishes for a well-deserved retirement."
Assistant Tax Assessor Bernadette Williams will step into the position Jan. 1, serving as acting tax assessor, according to the release. Williams received training in the fundamentals of mass appraisal, assessment administration and the fundamentals of real-property appraisal from the International Association of Assessing Officers. She has worked alongside Martin since joining the Tax Assessor's Office in 1995, the release said.
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