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Subject: FW: Please Assist - City Resolution Needed to Continue Stai
Attachments: Herbert Lee Simon - Street Codesignation.doc
Herbert Lee Simon
SIMON, HERBERT LEE, a Miami resident since 1935 celebrated his 90th birthday 0ct.19. Beloved
husband of Jeannette for 69 wonderful years; dedicated and proud father of Patrica Lyons (Richard)
and Barbara Ehrlich (Alan); adored grandfather of Jonathan Lyons (Barbara), Beverly Brennan (Derek),
Michael Lyons (Stephanie), Michelle Zarr Wilson (Andrew), Doting great-grandfather (Umpa) of
Benjamin, Matthew, Avner, Zachary, Samuel, and Andrew. He was truly dedicated to his entire family
and nothing was more fulfilling than time with them. He offered advice when asked, but was never
judgmental. He was a realtor and 3 time president of the Miami Board of Realtors. He was a man of his
word with unquestionable ethics. He loved fishing, computers, and fixing things for anyone who needed
him. Words can never express our sorrow and how much he was loved and will be missed. He was our
rock and our heart. Services were held. To visit this Guest Book Online, go to
www.MiamiHerald.com/obituaries.
Published in The Miami Herald from October 24 to October 27, 2009
Below is info that our board has from a book titled, "The Greatest Sale of Earth — The Story of the
Miami Board of Realtors® 1920-1980" by Stuart McIver. You may enjoy reading the excerpts below,
especially the historic aspect of the property tax battle in Dade and the creation of the Realtors Political
Action Committee (RPAC).
Herb Simon was born in Washington, moving to Miami in 1935. A member of a family of Realtors, he
began selling real estate at age eighteen. By the time he assumed the presidency for the first of his three
terms —1962,1973 & 1981— he had already served the board actively as chairman of the Court of Ethics
and of Arbitration committees as well as second vice-president.
Herb Simon emphasized service and improved communication to the members of the Miami board. The
complete installation of all Dade County's plat books meant the start of the Miami Board of Realtors
Department of Information. The service, when first proposed by Herb Simon, was rejected, but a write-
in vote from the members turned the tide. The plat -book service became so well used that eventually two
people were needed full-time to answer phone calls from members requesting locations, address, lot sizes
and legal descriptions of properties that interested them. To the plat books were added Dade County's
entire tax rolls, as published by Real Estate Directories, Inc.
In the summer of 1970 a large and powerful man sat I his office peering at his mail with rapidly rising
unhappiness. Richard A. Mueller, the "Red Barron", was not a man to trifle with. He was a former
football player at the University of Illinois and had been a marine in the Korean Way. He did not like
what he saw in his mail. So he called his friend and fellow Realtor, Ken Rosen.
"Ken, have a whole bunch of tax notices here, and they're all up. The thing that bothers me is this. They're all
up the same amount, exactly twenty-five percent."
"Okay, Dick, I'll check mine out."
Like Mueller, Rosen owned a number of properties and managed others for their owners. Between them, the
two men could have a look a tax notices for well over a hundred properties. When Rosen found that his were
all up the same amount, twenty-five percent, he called Herb Simon. With Simon the story was exactly the
same.
The three of them told Mildred Callahan what they had found. She created a special tax committee consisting
of the three of them, with Simon serving as chairman. The committee dug in and found that over 25,000
complaints had already poured into the county, overwhelming the Board of Tax Adjustment, made up of three
Metro commissioners and two school board members. They also found that taxes throughout the county had
been raised a flat twenty-five percent of houses and buildings. But most incredible of all, they found forty-eight
cases in Miami alone where the assessment of buildings condemned as uninhabitable or actually demolished by
owners had been raised, and always by the same twenty-five percent.
Simon charged that the county had simply taken the 1969 assessed valuation of property improvements and
added twenty-five percent to each one without consideration of condition or location.
"Why do we need a tax assessor's office if all they do is run it through a computer?" he asked. "Any kid with
an adding machine could have done that. We're not after a reduction. We're after equity."
Rosen shook his head in amazement. "This is what happens when you use a computer instead of good sense.
They should have made an effort to get out and inspect property instead of staying in their air-conditioned
offices."
After thousands to man-hours of work, the committee recommended that they board take an action unlike any it
had ever taken in the past. And the board agreed for the first time to engage in a lawsuit against a governmental
entity. On September 18, 1970, the committee, representing the Miami Board of Realtors, filed suit in Dade
Circuit Court to have the 1970-71 county tax roll invalidated. Named in the suit were Dade's acting county
manager, Hoke Welch; tax assessor, W. Wirt Culbertson; tax collector, Robert Overstreet; and the state
comptroller, Fred Dickinson.
Steve Clark, mayor of Miami, came out solidly behind the Realtors:
This research by the Special Tax Committee of the Miami Board, representing 1,700 specialists in the
field... shows conclusively that the assessed valuation of virtually all buildings in the county were raised by 25
percent without regard to condition, location, market value, or any other factors which should be used in
determining such assessments.
On November 5, 1970, Circuit Court Judge Thomas E. Lee returned his verdict. Both sides claimed victory.
Judge Lee refused to invalidate the 1970 tax roll, pointing to the "chaos and confusion" that would result if the
tax roll were tossed out the very week the tax collector was ready to begin mailing 300,000 tax bills. This
ruling made the board technically the loser, but Judge Lee went on to say that the use of a uniform multiplier or
fixed percentage factor in the preparation of the assessment roll is not an acceptable assessment practice under
the laws of Florida and should not be employed.
"You see, we did not really lose," said Herb Simon. "We may have to swallow the 1970 roll, but we won't
have to live with one like it again. We interpret Judge Lee's ruling to mean that they can never use a straight
multiplier again."
Another victory for the board emerged from the judge's ruling. He assessed the defendant, Dade County, for
court costs and commended the board "for their sincere service in compiling information which has clearly
revealed the inadequacies in the tax assessing procedures and results."
The move into the political arena was strengthened further by the creation of a special committee known as the
Realtors for Good Government Committee, later renamed the Realtors Political Action Committee (RPAC).
It was formed to call to the attention of members the importance of becoming involved in government affairs to
protect the property interests of the public.