Weeds Galore Bring Record $10,297 Tax Assessment

Few homeowners are looking forward to next week’s property tax payment deadline. Fewer still are dreading it as much as Miller Thomas is.

Instead of the $550 annual Los Angeles County tax bill he expected for his Canoga Park home, Thomas got one for $10,850.57.

Along with the usual assessments for schools, sewers and city services, he has been charged $10,297 for weed abatement work done by the city on his 100-foot-wide Gresham Street lot.

Los Angeles city officials call the expensive weed removal bill something of a record.

Thomas calls it outrageous. He says the same thing about the city’s weed cleanup in his 300-foot-deep backyard.

‘Guys Were Goons’

“They tore out my fruit trees and my grape arbor and tore down the building where I kept my old antique TVs,” said Thomas, a 78-year-old pensioner who has lived in Canoga Park since 1946.

“Where in the hell did they get the right to do that? Those guys were goons. They took the law into their own hands. I can’t afford to pay that.”

City officials said they sent a bulldozer, dump trucks and a 10-man crew to the house for six days in October, 1985. They said they acted after Thomas ignored several notices ordering him to clean up flammable weeds and piles of wood.

‘Unbelievable’ Says Inspector

“It was a fire hazard,” said Los Angeles City Fire Department Capt. Robert Robar, who initiated the cleanup. His Chatsworth station is in charge of fire protection for Thomas’ neighborhood.

“It was unbelievable,” said city Fire Inspector Mike Theule, who helped oversee the cleanup of Thomas’s backyard.

“He had an old farm that looked like it dated from the turn of the century falling in a heap. There were old buildings about to fall down. It looked like the Grapes of Wrath.”

Thomas lives in a 50-year-old Spanish-style house on the front of the lot with his 72-year-old wife, Mary. He disagrees that the backyard was a mess.

He said his rear buildings were sheds, a chicken coop and a rabbit hutch that were left over from the days when his now-grown sons were involved with 4-H.

That was a time, he said, when his was not the only single-family house left on his stretch of Gresham Street. Today, the tiny house is surrounded by apartment buildings. Thomas said he suspects that nearby apartment dwellers complained to firemen about his yard’s looks.

Neighbors Like View

Apartment residents who overlook Thomas’ house said they like the view, however.

“I think it’s fine. The greenery is nice and it’s something different for us to look at. I’d rather have that than a parking lot,” said Mike Thalhofer, one of the neighbors.

William Bukey said he watched the city cleanup with dismay from his apartment window.

“I don’t see why they ripped down everything they did,” Bukey said. “The $10,000 bill he got is ridiculous. They had 15 people standing around most of the day while the bulldozer did most of the work.”

Thomas said he was undergoing radiation treatment for a bladder tumor at the time of the cleanup. He said he has demanded an accounting of the assessment from the city. He charged that officials have refused to detail the number of man-hours spent or truckloads of material removed, however.

“They told me not to worry about the bill because I don’t have to pay it because they’ll put a lien on my house and sell it after I die,” Thomas said. “But this house is for my oldest son. He’s in Camarillo State Hospital now, but this is for him when he gets out.” Thomas said the son had a nervous breakdown in 1965.

William C. Moore, superintendent of Los Angeles’ lot cleaning division, said he has attempted to explain to Thomas how he can appeal the assessment. He said city officials likewise tried to persuade Thomas to clean up his lot before they did it for him.

Moore said the $10,297 weed-abatement charge is the highest or “very close to the highest” in city history. Few of the 5,000 lot cleanups the city does each year costs the property owner more than $1,000, he said.

“Mr. Thomas’s bill is a high figure for us, too,” Moore said. “No one says we’re cheap. We try to get people to do it themselves, but if they don’t we’re locked in.

“We’re always going to come out as the heavy in these situations. But you shouldn’t ignore a notice you get from an agency. Eventually the notice will be satisfied by referral to an agency like ours and you’re going to get charged for it. We’d prefer people do their own work and sweat, or have it done themselves.”

No Senior Evicted

Richard A. Dixon, Los Angeles County treasurer and tax collector, said Thursday it is doubtful that Thomas will be kicked out of his house for not paying the assessment. He said that in his 28 years with the county, no elderly person has ever been evicted because of inability to pay a property tax assessment.

A spokeswoman for the state controller’s office in Sacramento said homeowners aged 62 and older can file for a tax postponement that is administered by her agency. The postponement is good for as long as the property owner lives in his house.