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Business groups seek protection of nonpublic commercial tax data; counties warn of costs and transparency tradeoffs
Summary
House File 2‑959 would prevent otherwise nonpublic commercial property financial data from becoming public through tax appeals. Business groups argued for protections; several counties, including Hennepin, opposed the bill citing administrative burden and potential limits on assessors' ability to set uniform values.
House File 2‑959 drew extended debate on April 3 over whether income and lease information for commercial properties should remain nonpublic when used in property tax appeals.
Representative Scott, sponsor of the bill, told the committee the measure responds to a Minnesota Supreme Court decision (Oracle) and seeks to prevent taxpayer financial information from being made public through the property tax appeal process. “Business owners invest significant effort in keeping financial information confidential, and it should not be publicly accessible through an open backdoor,” said Gowri Samant, a property tax attorney representing BOMA, IREM/NYIOP and the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce.
Testimony from proponents stressed two problems: counties can make confidential taxpayer data public by introducing it at trial, and taxpayers have a more limited ability to access comparable county data under the current balancing test for disclosure. The bill would (a) prevent counties from unilaterally disseminating nonpublic income and lease information in trial records and (b) create a short 30‑day cure period when income‑producing property owners miss a filing deadline so cases are not dismissed on technicalities.
Hennepin County Assistant Administrator Dan Rogan testified in opposition, calling the proposal “a solution in search of a significant problem” and warning the bill would eliminate the statutory balancing test that allows courts to weigh relevance and confidentiality. Rogan said mass production of third‑party income data to petitioners would create administrative burdens, risk misuse even under protective orders, and could hamper assessors’ ability to use such data to produce uniform assessments.
Hennepin County Assessor Josh Hoagland and other assessors joined the opposition, noting assessors rely on income and expense data especially in markets with limited sales data. Advocates for the proposal replied that county assessors already can use the data and the bill would mainly prevent putting such data into the public domain; proponents also said the bill would level the evidentiary playing field between counties and taxpayers.
Committee members asked for more stakeholder work. Representative Scott said she would continue discussions and the committee laid the bill over for further negotiation.
