Word: puglia
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Still, John Howe's personal unfamiliarity with the assessment process is unusual. Alderman Puglia calls Howe "the most unqualified assessor in the history of Massachusetts." In a deposition under oath during assessment victim Cosmo Capobianco's libel suit against Howe, Howe admitted that he has had "very little" training in the real estate business, and that he did not know the most important and elementary concept an assessor must learn--the three basic methods of appraising the value of real estate...
Nearly a year later, Somerville Alderman Andrew Puglia discovered that the property on Charnwood Road was owned by John's older sister Marie, and that the property's beneficiaries were listed on the property deed as "John J. Howe and Kristen Howe." Thus assessor Howe lowered the taxes on a piece of property owned by his own family...
...When have you ever heard of an assessor lowering the assessment so the owners could sell the house?" Puglia, a political opponent of the Howes, asks. "That's unheard of. You're supposed to lower the assessment only if the property has gone down in value. And then, all of a sudden, a few months later, lo and behold, Howe's sister buys the property...
Several months after Marie Howe bought the Charnwood Road property, her brother raised the assessment by $900. He says he did this because the property had increased in value after his earlier assessment because it was no longer vacant. But Alderman Puglia charges that Howe raised the assessment only when he found out he was being investigated for conflict-of-interest. "After they became aware that I was snooping around, they took a pencil and tried to cover their tracks by changing the assessment," Puglia charges...
...down Italy last week, from the earthquake-shattered Alpine foothills of Friuli in the north to the fields of Calabria and Puglia in the south, already burning under the summer sun, an estimated 41 million voters were involved in a national election that may be the most crucial in the country's history. It was not only the Italians who were deeply concerned about the outcome. In the capitals of Western Europe, in Washington and Moscow, politicians and diplomats were anxiously waiting to learn what the voters will decide when they line up at the polls on June...