This week, Santa Clara County Assessor Larry Stone has agreed to answer questions from San Jose Inside readers. He is the sixth public official to participate in this series. Questions are selected from online posts to this site.
Stone’s answers will be posted in a Q&A format. If an answer seems incomplete or unsatisfactory, SJI will do its best to follow up.
Elected to the County Assessor’s office in 1994, Stone previously served as a councilman and mayor in Sunnyvale for more than 16 years. One of the most powerful political leaders in the Bay Area, Stone has implemented numerous improvements in his office while dealing with a volatile real estate market. Before coming into office, her worked as a financial manager on Wall Street and also founded two Bay Area real estate investment and development firms. He has been a strong advocate for the Oakland A’s relocation to San Jose.
To submit a question, post below.
When you go to federal prison for criminally colluding with Reed and Wolfe, will you be comfortable without your secretarial staff?
I’m a week away from moving into my first house in Plant 51, a condo complex across the street from the planned stadium if the Oakland A’s move to San Jose. How will the new stadium and development impact property values in The Alameda region of San Jose?
What do you think is the best path for San Jose in order to reduce our debt while providing fair benefits for public employees, and will it be possible to effectively combat San Jose’s growing gang problem while dealing with these fiscal issues?
Keep filing out forms/ and calls to get a real property adjustment of my property taxes but no reply. Who do I need to call to get a real person on the phone. Proprty has obvisouly dropped like everyone else in the valley, why do you make it so hard.
Can you see by the lack of questions that the citizens offer you no credibility and only see you as a Tool of the government and that it’s fruitless to try to effect real change by interacting with you?
I understand you must use some metric to assess properties in the county, but I am curious how so many people (many of my neighbors) were able to drastically reduce their assessed values based on submittals they sent to you. It seems that pure assessment based on zip code and square footage is not necessarily a ‘true’ valuation of property in the county. Are you legally bound to reduce property assessments purely on submitted (and in my opinion, often compiled based on chicanery) information sent to you by homeowners?
Chris Mizera