HomeMy WebLinkAbout09-15-09
1 THE COURT: Mr. Mumma, this is your pro ae
2 petition. I'm not quite sure -- it's 10 pages and 50
3 allegations, 52 allegations. What are you asking of this
4 Court today, sir?
5 MR. MUMMA: I would like you to instruct them
6 to pay all of the outstanding real estate taxes on this
7 piece of property.
$ THE COURT: They are Executors of the Trust
9 and the Estate, are they not?
10 MR. MUMMA: They represent them.
11 THE COURT: Okay. You represent the
12 Executors. There will be a final accounting at some point
13 filed, will there not?
14 MR. MUMMA: Well, there's been a final
15 accounting filed. It hasn't been prorated.
16 THE COURT: Okay.
17 MR. MUMMA: The issue --
18 THE COURT: I don't believe the Court is in a
19 position to micromanage the management of an Estate or a
20 Trust. When there's a final accounting filed, you can
21 object to the accounting and ask that surcharges be imposed
22 if you feel there's been a violation of fiduciary duties. I
23 would stop the impending sale of the real estate, but I'm
24 not sure that any court wants to get involved in the
25 micromanaging of dealing with taxes that are paid late. If
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1 they did something wrong, there's procedures for surcharging
2 them, sir. There is no irreparable harm being done here.
3 MR. MUMMA: Well, we could lose the property.
4 THE COURT: If that were before me, I would
5 rule upon that, that's correct. Is that before me?
6 MR. MUMMA: Well, yes. We're trying to stop
7 a Sheriff's Sale.
$ THE COURT: Is there a Sheriff's Sale
9 scheduled?
10 MR. MUMMA: Yes. There was last year.
11 THE COURT: Last year is over with. When is
12 the one scheduled this year?
13 MR. MUMMA: September the 24th or 25th, I
14 believe.
15 THE COURT: Do you object to an order that
16 indicates that the taxes are to be paid before the Sheriff's
17 Sale?
18 MR. FALLER: The only objection, Your Honor
19 -- and I think it's set forth in the pleadings -- was that
20 the Executrices' position, based on advice of counsel, is
21 that the real estate involving the eight tenths of an acre
22 is the remaining piece from a larger development that's only
23 usable as a retention pond and is really a liability as
24 opposed to an asset.
25 THE COURT: What is being -- I didn't read in
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1 your pleadings, sir, or if I did, I missed it, because
2 there's so much in there that need not be in there --
3 MR. MUMMA: May I --
4 THE COURT: Just tell me what it is that you
5 want me to do today.
6 MR. MUMMA: Pennsylvania Supply Company wants
7 you to instruct them to pay the taxes on this property, all
8 of the outstanding real estate taxes.
9 THE COURT: I'm not going to do that. If you
10 have some emergency that's in front of me, I will deal with
it it. I'm not going to micromanage how or when a trustee pays
12 its bills.
13 MR. MUMMA: Your Honor, the property is owned
14 by Pennsylvania Supply Company. That's who the deed is made
15 out to. That's whose property is being sold.
16 THE COURT: Pennsy Supply is not a --
17 MR. MUMMA: It's Pennsylvania Supply Company,
18 not Pennsy Supply.
19 THE COURT: Are they a party to this action?
20 MR. MUMMA: I'm an officer of Pennsylvania
21 Supply Company and a shareholder.
22 THE COURT: But you have no standing. You
23 can't represent Pennsylvania Supply Company in court. You
24 need a lawyer to do that, unless you're a member of the bar.
25 MR. MUMMA: No, I'm not.
4
THE COURT: Okay.
2 MR. MUMMA: As you know, I'm not.
3 THE COURT: Then give me, in one sentence,
4 what it is you're asking me to do today. Does it ask in
5 this petition that I stop an impending tax sale?
6 MR. MUMMA: Yes, it does.
~ THE COURT: That I will do. Let me hear
8 evidence on that and that alone. I would suggest, Mr.
9 Mumma, that if you had put that more simply that we wouldn't
10 have needed this right now. Give me your relationship. Why
11 are you here to stop that?
12 MR. MUMMA: Your Honor, I filed a motion last
13 year to have this --
14 THE COURT: I don't care about last year.
15 MR. MUMMA: Well, but they represented to the
16 Court last year that all of the outstanding taxes had been
17 timely paid. Here we are this year with the same issue,
18 because they weren't paid last year. They misrepresented
19 that to the Court. We're just asking them to do what they
20 said they had done last year, pay these taxes.
21 THE COURT: First of all, give me your
22 position in standing. How are you here? You cannot be here
23 as an officer of Pennsylvania Supply.
24 MR. MUMMA: I can be here as a beneficiary of
25 the Estate.
5
THE COURT: Okay. So, you're representing
2 yourself as a beneficiary of the Estate?
3 MR. MUMMA: Yes.
4 THE COURT: All right. Call your first
5 witness.
6 MR. MUMMA: Well, I would like to just put
7 some exhibits in if I could.
8 THE COURT: Well, you've got to do that under
9 oath and identify the exhibits.
10 MR. MUMMA: Okay.
11 THE COURT: Give me the document that shows
12 that it's scheduled for tax sale. Are you marking that as
13 Petitioner 1?
14 MR. MUMMA: Petitioner 1. It is a final
15 reminder notice --
16 THE COURT: Hold on. Let's get it marked.
17 Do you have any objection to Petitioner 1?
18 MR. FALLER: No. He showed me that.
19 THE COURT: All right. Petitioner 1 is
20 admitted. Hand it up. What is your next exhibit?
21 MR. MUMMA: This is a certified notice of
22 public sale from the Tax Claim Bureau.
23 THE COURT: Any objection to No. 2?
24 MR. FALLER: I'm not sure. The date seems to
25 be cut off. It seems to be the one from 2008.
6
THE COURT: No, it couldn't be from 2008,
2 because it's dated August 6, and it says the last payment
3 was 9/14/08.
4 MR. FALLER: Well, assuming this is from --
5 the date up there would be August 6th, 2009, we don't have
6 an objection. We agree that it is listed for tax sale
7 September 24th.
8 THE COURT: Wait a second. Is this from this
9 year or last year? It says it has to be paid by September
10 25th, 2008.
11 MR. MUMMA: This is the original notice, I
12 believe, that prompted last year's emergency motion.
13 THE COURT: This is not admitted.
14 MR. MUMMA: This may be part of the record,
15 Your Honor, the emergency motion we filed last year.
16 THE COURT: I'm not interested in last year,
17 Mr. Mumma. Have I not made that clear?
18 MR. MUMMA: You have made that clear, but
19 their misrepresentation to the Court last year is why this
20 wasn't heard last year.
21 MR. FALLER: Your Honor, if it's helpful,
22 we'll stipulate on behalf of the Trustees and Executrices
23 that it is scheduled for tax sale this year, the same
24 property that's mentioned in both of these notices.
25 THE COURT: On what date?
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1 MR. FALLER: I believe it's September 25th,
2 2009.
3 THE COURT: Then I will tell you, Mr. Mumma,
4 that you are entitled to relief as far as this year goes, or
5 at least you've proven -- I will hear the defense that they
6 have and go from there. What else do you want to make part
7 of the record?
8 MR. MUMMA: Z want the current year's taxes
9 paid, Your Honor.
10 THE COURT: We'll deal with that next year.
11 I'm not going to micromanage that, Mr. Mumma. I've already
12 told you that.
13 MR. MUMMA: I understand that, but my name is
14 on as an officer of the corporation. It's a reflection on
15 me, personally, that these taxes are past due. They're
16 doing it to destroy my credit rating in the area. I don't
17 think I should be subject to that because they have failed
18 to pay these taxes. Otherwise, I'm going to have to pay
19 them myself to clean that up, and I'll be going without
20 reimbursement to pay something that they personally are
21 using against me as a hammer.
22 THE COURT: Well, again, that is -- a Truat
23 was set up. An Estate was set up. They are the Executrices
24 of the Estate. They determine when the bills get paid. I'm
25 not going to micromanage how they do their assets.
8
MR. MUMMA: It's not their bill. It's
2 Pennsylvania Supply Company's bill. Pennsylvania Supply
3 Company is the title holder. They are refusing to provide
4 the funds to Pennsylvania Supply Company. They took all of
5 their money, and they are refusing to provide the funds to
6 pay these taxes.
~ THE COURT: Defense.
8 MR. FALLER: Your Honor, our position is that
9 the Executrices/Trustees were advised that --
10 THE COURT: Wait. Don't take a position.
11 Present evidence. The evidence I have before me is that the
12 taxes aren't paid.
13 MR. FALLER: Correct, on a .83 lot.
14 THE COURT: Whatever. It's real estate.
15 It's owned by the Trust or the Estate. They do have a
16 fiduciary duty with regard to that. So, if you want to
17 present evidence that it's not worthwhile, present evidence.
18 Don't present argument.
19 MR. FALLER: Okay. What I was trying to get
20 to, to tell you our position, was it would be inconsistent
21 to have the Executrix travel from Florida using Estate funds
22 -- and for that reason, she is available by telephone -- but
23 it would be inconsistent with our position to have had her
24 travel to attend this hearing with that as the background.
25 MR. MUMMA: Your Honor, can they produce
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evidence that the Estate owns this property? I mean, I
2 think that's one of the threshold questions here. They say
3 they own it, but they don't have any evidence of ownership.
4 The deed for this property is in the name of Pennsylvania
5 Supply Company, period.
6 MR. FALLER: Your Honor, if that's the
7 position he's taking, I don't know why he filed this
8 petition in the Orphans' Court asking for an order with the
9 Executrices.
10 THE COURT: That confuses me, also, Mr.
11 Mumma. If Pennsylvania Supply Company owns this property,
12 then why should they be paying the taxes at all?
13 MR. MUMMA: Because they have been paying the
14 taxes for the last 20 years, apparently, and they have taken
15 all of Pennsylvania Supply Company's money.
16 THE COURT: None of that is before me, nor am
17 I going to get into it today. I am not going to determine
18 who owns the property.
19 MR. MUMMA: That's fine. I just want the
20 taxes paid at this point in time.
21 THE COURT: All right. That will be done.
22 We'll enter the following order:
23 And now, this 31st day of August, 2009, after
24 hearing, the Respondents are ordered and directed to take
25 immediate steps to make sure that the taxes are paid prior
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to the upcoming tax sale scheduled for September 24, 2009.
2 I'm not even sure I have the authority to
3 order them to timely pay it in the future. I know there's
4 an order to pay that which is out there. It would be like
5 telling me that -- asking the Court to have a trustee pay a
6 supplier at the 2 percent discount. I'm not going to get
7 involved in that. There's a forum for that, Mr. Mumma.
8 When the account is filed, if there are penalties that were
9 incurred there, if they inappropriately incurred those
10 penalties, they can be surcharged. And there may be
11 reasons, but I'm not in a position to get into that.
12 The other issues that you raised with regard
13 to your creditors -- again, that's something that's not
14 before me today. If you want to have a determination on
15 whether or not the Estate owns the property, get the lawyer
16 for Pennsylvania Supply Company to bring an action to quiet
17 title or an action for declaratory judgment.
18 MR. MUMMA: Your Honor, I appreciate that. I
19 was here for this very narrow purpose, saving the property.
20 THE COURT: Good. That we've done.
21 MR. MUMMA: Thank you, Your Honor.
22 MR. FALLER: Your Honor, while we are still
23 on the record, I had sent a request to your office in
24 writing last week to allow the Executrix to testify via
25 telephone. I had carbon-copied Barbara Mumma with that, and
it
she said that was the first notice she got of the hearing
2 today. I just wanted to call to the Court's attention that
3 there may be still times where she is getting missed with
4 service of orders. She mentioned that to me. I just wanted
5 to call it to the Court's attention.
6 THE COURT: To take the position of a state
7 employee, it's not my job.
8 BARBARA MUMMA: So, what should I do, sir? I
9 didn't know about today's hearing until -- I was on
10 vacation. It's a last minute thing. I thought it was for
11 taxes for two other properties we had, and so I rushed up
12 here, and it's for a different property.
13 THE COURT: The obligation for service is on
14 the Petitioner.
15 MR. FALLER: I think she got both the
16 petition and the answer. It was just Judge Oler's order
17 that set the hearing.
18 THE COURT: That's even more not m
y job . The
19 Petitioner, by local rule, is supposed to include envelopes
20 addressed to the appropriate parties.
21 I'll make reference to a letter. The Court
22 doesn't deal with substantive matters by letter. If you
23 wanted the Executrix to testify by telephone, it should have
24 been in the form of a motion indicating concurrence or
25 nonconcurrence, and not in the form of an ex parte letter.
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13
CERTIFICATION
I hereby certify that the proceedings are
contained fully and accurately in the notes taken by me on
the above cause and that this is a correct transcript of
same.
~i~QA+~I I C.-~Q~
Susan Rice Stoner
Official Stenographer
The foregoing record of the proceedings on
the hearing of the within matter is hereby approved and
directed to be filed.
~~~a?
Date
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