Jul 24, 2002 2 min read

Had Earl Springer not written a Letter to the Editor that appears today on this page, the public might not have been aware of a blunder by the Fayette County Tax Claim Bureau. The bureau’s director Donna Yauger on Monday explained to a reporter, after being asked about the contents of Mr. Springer’s letter, that a computer glitch created the appearance that every property owner failed to pay taxes. So a mass mailing went out, via registered mail at $4.42 a notice, informing property owners that they were delinquent.

This is a costly mistake; both in the dollar amount that has yet to be fully calculated and in the harm to the relationship the county has attempted to cultivate with taxpayers.

Yauger’s office first should have foreseen that something wasn’t right when a computer flagged many more than the usual number of delinquents. A computer might be to blame for initiating a problem, but humans had to have noted the stack of notices. Humans had to have handled the notices. And humans had to have posted the notices.

Even if the mistake wasn’t discovered until after the mail was delivered, Yauger should have attempted to ease troubled minds by announcing to the public that a mistake was made.

Instead, plenty of folks like Mr. Springer spent time combing for receipts, repeatedly attempting to connect with the office by telephone and then standing in line to seek an explanation.

Yauger told our reporter that if property owners believe they received a past due notice in error, they needn’t stop by the office, they can just call the office.

She could have saved plenty of people, like Mr. Springer, time and aggravation had she made this announcement when the mistake was first noticed.