A Richmondville man is calling an assessor's use of personal Facebook photos as a way to establish the value of his Brooker Hollow Road home "creepy, unethical, and illegal."
Deb Ker, the assessor, declined to comment on either Bob Nied's allegations or the incident, which began last October.
And JR Parshall, the town's attorney, said there's nothing illegal about what Ms. Ker did.
Mr. Parshall also said he finds it ironic and bizarre that Mr. Nied has made public an issue that Mr. Nied himself argues is one of privacy.
"There were some things we agreed to look into and do and we've been working diligently on them," Mr. Parshall said.
"I thought we'd come to an agreement on this. We haven't heard from Bob in months. I'm not sure why it's coming up now."
It's coming up now, Mr. Nied said, because the issue is larger than what happened to him and his wife, Renee.
Not only Richmondville, but all of Schoharie County needs to take a closer look at the uncharted waters of Facebook and other social media and establish policies and procedures for their use-and misuse.
According to Mr. Nied, their problems with Ms. Ker began when they took an 8.5 percent increase in their property tax assessment to Small Claims Assessment Review Court.
They came well-prepared to the hearing, Mr. Nied said, and when it became clear the hearing officer was sympathetic to their case, Ms. Ker produced family photos they immediately recognized as having been "trolled" from Mr. Nied's Facebook account.
"They were bizarrely personal photos of family and friends," he said. "They had nothing to do with our house...one of them wasn't even our house-it was a friend's."
Even if it had been their home, Mr. Nied said, there was nothing to be gleaned from them about the home's interior for assessment purposes; one photo was a close-up of his son's face, another was of his son's guitars.
Mr. Nied said the hearing officer immediately said he didn't want to see the photos; ultimately, he ruled in the Nieds' favor.
But they were so outraged by the photos, he said, that they filed a complaint with the Town of Richmondville, seeking all copies of the photos-both those Ms. Ker attempted to present at the hearing along with additional personal photos they found in their tax file following a FOIL request-and a letter of apology, which Ms. Ker has done.
They've also asked the town to develop a set of policies and procedures on assessor data collection methods and have asked the State Department of Taxation and Finance for an opinion on the issue and filed an ethics complaint with the Assessors Association.
Mr. Nied said the town also agreed to refer the incident to Schoharie County District Attorney Jim Sacket to determine whether Ms. Ker violated copyright laws.
They're still waiting to hear back from the state, assessors, and DA, he said.
While he agrees with Mr. Parshall that this began as an issue of privacy, Mr. Nied said he's gone public with it to prompt the town to act and to alert other property owners.
"She didn't bring out the photos until it became apparent things weren't going her way," Mr. Nied said of Ms. Ker.
"It was clearly meant to intimidate us. And I think to have the assessor trolling Facebook is not in the best interests of any town."