A perusal of the provisions of the Housing Authority relating to the interpretation of section 85 of the Real Estate Taxation Law shows us that there is no argument in it to support the new interpretation that the respondent first raised in his summaries in the appeals in question, which he asks the appeals committee to adopt, regarding the conditions and rules that must be applied to a taxpayer seeking to amend an assessment. Moreover, it is not possible to find in the provisions of the Income Tax Law any reference to create a parallel between the principles of amending an assessment under section 85 of the Real Estate Taxation Law and amending an income tax report in accordance with the provision of section 147 of the Income Tax Ordinance.
- If this is not enough, then the obvious question arises, whether the respondent indeed believes that a parallel should be created between the amendment of the assessment according to Article 85 of the Real Estate Taxation Law and the amendment of a report or assessment under Article 147 To the Income Tax Ordinance – why at no stage did the Income Tax and Real Estate Taxation Commission issue an appropriate executive order in this regard?
- On the subject of amending an assessment according to Article 85 The Real Estate Taxation Law has a number of executive provisions: The first of them, the Executive Order 28/92 of December 29, 1992, deals with the "Procedure for Amending an Assessment under Section 85 of the Real Estate Appreciation Tax Law", and it states that: "As part of the improvement of the service to the taxpayer, it was determined that when the authorized person under the law decides to amend the assessment in accordance with section 85, he must notify the taxpayer of this in Form No. 7110... and to detail the reasons for this, in parallel with the transmission of the revised assessment to the computer. Care must be taken to write the reasons clearly - both from the content and the formal point of view."
Thus, this execution instruction actually obligates the respondent to clearly specify the reasons for amending the assessment.
- In addition, on April 24, 1995, another execution directive was published, Betterment Tax Execution Directive 12/95, which deals with "reasoning decisions in an objection or a decision to amend an assessment under section 85", which is in fact a refresher directive, and it states that: "Despite the explicit instructions and reminders sent to the units in this regard, there is no full care to justify the decision in the objection, or to the decision to open the assessment in accordance with section 85 of the Law. This causes injustice to the taxpayers who do not understand the reason for rejecting the objection or accepting it only partially, on the other hand, a great deal of damage is caused to the good name of the division."
An additional refresher provision in this regard exists in the framework of Executive Order 21/96 of November 24, 1996.
- It should be emphasized that notwithstanding the aforementioned execution provisions M.S. 28/92, M.S. 12/05 and 21/96 – it appears that decisions on the execution of assessment amendments initiated by the Respondent – do not include reasons or explanations as to the reason for the amendment and why it is required, beyond specifying the reason for the amendment according to Section 85(3) Regarding an "error" in the assessment.
In this regard, see Appendices 1 and 2 to the affidavit of Ms. Deborah Baruch, filed on January 20, 2025 (after the decision on the request to add evidence), which include decisions dated January 10, 2024, by Mr. Raphael Bates, a field manager at the Respondent's offices, regarding the amendment of a purchase tax assessment issued to Shmuel Baruch, which all that is stated in it is as follows: