At the Harris Ranch CID Board meeting on July 20, 2021, a concerning issue was raised by HRCIDTA president Larry Crowley during his testimony in front of the Board. The issue was about an alleged lack of disclosure about the CID in homebuyers’ closing documents. His quote, directly from the transcript HRCID Board transcriptof the meeting, reads:
“We purchased our house just over 3 years ago and, at that time, received no notification, no disclosure, or any idea of the impact that the CID would have on our property taxes. It wasn’t until we received our first property tax bill in 2019 that we began looking into it and trying to figure out where all of this money came from and where is it going and how does it get there. So, the disclosure issue is a really important one. As Bill points out, when we went through closing, we went through all my closing documents. We’ve refinanced a couple of times, and there is no disclosure statement included in any of the closing documents from our transaction.”
Failing to disclose the CID to a homebuyer is a serious accusation, and one that helped Crowley and the HRCIDTA stake a position as an aggrieved party.
However, Mr. Crowley’s statement to the Harris Ranch CID Board does not appear to be accurate.
Documentation shows that Mr. Crowley was very well informed of the CID throughout the homebuying process. According to documents filed in response to HRCIDTA claims and available on the HRCID’s website, Mr. Crowley was told that the home he and his wife were buying was included in the CID on several occasions. Disclosures included:
- March 12, 2018 – email to Crowley’s real estate agent confirming that the home was in the CID
- May 10, 2018 – The Real Estate Purchase and Sale Agreement, signed and initialed by Crowley and his wife on each page, including on page 2 where the first item under Additional Terms and/or Conditions reads in bold, “1) Buyer acknowledges Property is in the Community CID taxing district.”
- October 31, 2018 – as part of the title process, Crowley and his wife signed an Acknowledgement and Approval of Title Commitment, CCR’s, and Plat Map document, which mentions the CID 7 times and includes a buyers’ acknowledgement and approval of, “Terms, covenants, conditions, restrictions, easements, and obligations, if any, contained in Resolution No. 20895 by the City of Boise City, declaring formation of the Harris Ranch Community Infrastructure District No. 1..
Click here for link to exhibits
Clearly, the suggestion that Mr. Crowley did not have knowledge of the Harris Ranch CID before purchasing his property is not accurate.
The misinformation campaign appears to continue as Mr. Crowley and HRCIDTA claimed a recent “big litigation win” in a Facebook post. Once again, this is entirely inaccurate. The judge’s decision was merely to pause their second lawsuit while the first runs its course. The first lawsuit, as noted in prior posts, resulted in a sweeping loss for the HRCIDTA on all sixteen of its claims. The judge in the second litigation simply chose to wait and see if the HRCIDTA appeals the first case and, if such an appeal is filed, whether the Idaho Supreme Court will uphold the first judge’s decision. A copy of the denial of the HRCIDTA’s loss in the first lawsuit here.
In his testimony to the Harris Ranch CID Board in July 2021, Mr. Crowley states that he went through all his closing documents and found no disclosure of the CID. The breadth of evidence against this statement is damning, at best. The HRCIDTA has lost on all 16 counts alleged in the first lawsuit; meanwhile, a significant basis for their complaints—an alleged lack of notice—is equally questionable.
