The American Inn, a retirement living community, is located at 1 Sawmill Park, Southwick. (Photo by Hope E. Tremblay)
SOUTHWICK – The town published a lengthy list of properties Thursday that owe over $3 million in taxes collectively, including $400,000 owed by The American Inn.
The list was in a legal notice published in The Westfield News Aug. 1, 2019.
The town assessor database lists Sawmill Park, Inc. as the owner of the American Inn Retirement Community at 1 Sawmill Park. The property encompasses 50 acres and has a large three-story building with both independent and assisted living apartments, cafeteria, fitness rooms, offices and more. It also includes single cottages throughout the property.
Its website states that property taxes and water and sewer fees are included in residential fees.
Town Clerk Michelle L. Hill said the roughly $400,000 is for FY19 taxes and the American Inn has had previous issues with its town bills.
“They have and still struggle to pay their bills with the town, whether it is real estate or water/sewer,” Hill said.
In the past, Hill has worked with the retirement community to get the bills paid.
“I have entered into a payment plan in the past when they made some payments towards their bills,” she stated. “This year, no bills were paid except half of the main building ($32,000 of the $64,000 bill).”
Each cottage and building is billed separately. Hill said the largest bill for the main building is $64,000 annually and the cottages average $2,800 each.
“There are 134 bills in total,” Hill said.
Town officials do not want to take over the property.
“That’s not the road we’re hoping for,” she said, noting the point of the legal notices is to secure the debt owed to Southwick.
Chief Administrative Officer Karl J. Stinehart said the town is following the law.
“The town is following the prescribed process under MGL to notify the landowner under the correct steps for tax recovery,” he said. “Each year when a town adopts a budget at Town Meeting it needs to raise the revenues or funds to meet that expense.”
Stinehart said the legal notice protects the town’s right to collect the real estate assessments levied by the Assessors Office under the law and MASS DOR guidelines.
“It is the same process utilized by any and all municipalities,” he said.
Outside of The American Inn, there are taxes owed for several other properties, many of which are land-only with no homes or other buildings.
A call to The American Inn for comment was not returned by press time.
