Greenwich Retail, LLC v. Greenwich

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Greenwich Retail, LLC v. Greenwich

GREENWICH RETAIL, LLC v.
TOWN OF GREENWICH
(AC 46825)
Moll, Suarez and Prescott, Js.

Syllabus

Pursuant to statute ((Rev. to 2019) § 12-63c (a) and (d)), in determining the
present true and actual value in any town of real property used primarily
for purposes of producing rental income, the town’s assessor may require
the submission of certain information regarding such property ‘‘on a form
provided by the assessor’’ and any property owner who fails to submit such
information ‘‘shall be subject to a penalty . . . .’’

The plaintiff property owner appealed from the trial court’s judgment ren-
dered for the defendant town upholding a municipal tax assessment of a
penalty imposed pursuant to § 12-63c (a) and (d). The plaintiff claimed,
inter alia, that the court incorrectly determined that the word ‘‘provided’’
in § 12-63c (a) does not require that an income and expense form actually
be received by the property owner and/or its agent. Held:

The trial court properly determined that the word ‘‘provided’’ in § 12-63c
(a) does not require that an income and expense form actually be received
by the property owner and/or its agent, as the term is plain and unambiguous
and simply means to be made available, there having been no indication
that it was intended to impose specific requirements on assessors with
respect to how they must make the income and expense forms available
to property owners, and, in light of the legislature’s comprehensive statutory
tax scheme, this court declined to add any such requirements onto the clear
statutory language.

The trial court properly determined that the mailing of the income and
expense form by the defendant’s assessor to the plaintiff’s last known
address satisfied the requirements of § 12-63c (a), as the court deemed the
evidence presented regarding the plaintiff having taken reasonable measures
to ensure that the assessor had an up-to-date mailing address to be uncertain
and speculative, the evidence presented at trial with respect to the proce-
dures that the defendant followed in sending a bulk mailing demonstrated
that they were consistent with the statutory and regulatory taxing scheme,
and the assessor provided the form pursuant to § 12-63c (a) by making it
available to the plaintiff using the most current information that she had
concerning the plaintiff’s mailing address, the unambiguous language of
§ 12-63c having required nothing further.

Argued October 7, 2024—officially released June 10, 2025
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Greenwich Retail, LLC v. Greenwich

Procedural History

Appeal from the decision of the defendant’s board
of assessment appeals imposing a penalty on the plain-
tiff for failing to timely file a certain form, brought to
the Superior Court in the judicial district of Stamford-
Norwalk and tried to the court, Hon. Kenneth B. Povo-
dator, judge trial referee; judgment for the defendant,
from which the plaintiff appealed to this court.
Affirmed.
James R. Fogarty, with whom was Andrew P. Nemir-
off, for the appellant (plaintiff).
Owen T. Weaver, with whom were Barbara M. Schel-
lenberg, and, on the brief, Dennis J. Kokenos, for the
appellee (defendant).
Opinion

SUAREZ, J. The principal issue in this municipal tax
appeal is whether the requirement of General Statutes
(Rev. to 2019) § 12-63c (a)1 that a municipal tax assessor
1
General Statutes (Rev. to 2019) § 12-63c provides in relevant part: ‘‘(a)
In determining the present true and actual value in any town of real property
used primarily for purposes of producing rental income, the assessor . . .
may require in the conduct of any appraisal of such property pursuant to
the capitalization of net income method . . . that the owner of such prop-
erty annually submit to the assessor not later than the first day of June, on
a form provided by the assessor not later than forty-five days before said
first day of June, the best available information disclosing the actual rental
and rental-related income and operating expenses applicable to such prop-
erty. . . .
‘‘(d) Any owner of such real property required to submit information
to the assessor in accordance with subsection (a) of this section for any
assessment year, who fails to submit such information as required under
said subsection (a) or who submits information in incomplete or false form
with intent to defraud, shall be subject to a penalty equal to a ten per cent
increase in the assessed value of such property for such assessment year.
. . .’’ (Emphasis added.)
We note that the legislature recently has amended § 12-63c. See Public
Acts 2023, No. 23-152, § 1; see also part I of this opinion. For the sake of
convenience, unless otherwise stated, all references to § 12-63c in this opin-
ion are to the 2019 revision of the statute.
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‘‘provide’’ an owner of real property that generates
rental income with a form on which to submit income
and expense information is satisfied when that form
is timely mailed to, but not actually received by, the
property owner and/or its agent. The plaintiff, Green-
wich Retail, LLC, appeals from the judgment of the trial
court rendered in favor of the defendant, the town of
Greenwich, challenging a municipal tax assessment of
a penalty pursuant to General Statutes §§ 12-117a and
12-119.2
On appeal, the plaintiff first claims that the court
incorrectly determined that the word ‘‘provided’’ in § 12-
63c (a) does not require that an income and expense
form actually be received by the property owner and/
or its agent. The plaintiff argues, to the extent that the
word ‘‘provided’’ is ambiguous, the court should have
strictly construed the statute in its favor. The plaintiff
also claims that the trial court erred in concluding that
the mailing of the form to the plaintiff by the defendant’s
assessor (assessor) to its last known address satisfied
§ 12-63c (a). We disagree and affirm the judgment of
the court.
The following facts, which either were found by the
trial court or are otherwise undisputed in the record,
and procedural history are relevant to our resolution
of this appeal. The plaintiff, a Delaware limited liability
company, owns certain real property located at 310
2
See General Statutes § 12-117a (a) (1) (‘‘[a]ny person . . . claiming to
be aggrieved by the action of . . . the board of assessment appeals . . .
in any town or city may make application . . . in the nature of an appeal
therefrom to the superior court for the judicial district in which such town
or city is situated’’); General Statutes § 12-119 (‘‘[w]hen it is claimed that
. . . a tax laid on property was computed on an assessment which, under
all the circumstances, was manifestly excessive and could not have been
arrived at except by disregarding the provisions of the statutes for determin-
ing the valuation of such property, the owner thereof . . . may, in addition
to the other remedies provided by law, make application for relief to the
superior court for the judicial district in which such town or city is situated’’).
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Greenwich Avenue in Greenwich (property). The
administration of the property, including tax matters,
is handled by ESRT Management TRS, LLC (ESRT), the
plaintiff’s representative property manager.
It is undisputed that the plaintiff’s property, as a
leased commercial property, falls within the scope of
§ 12-63c, which governs the submission of income and
expense information applicable to certain real proper-
ties that generate rental income. Specifically, under
§ 12-63c, a municipal assessor may require an owner
of real property that generates rental income ‘‘annually
[to] submit to the assessor not later than the first day
of June, on a form provided by the assessor not later
than forty-five days before said first day of June, the
best available information disclosing the actual rental
and rental-related income and operating expenses appli-
cable to such property,’’ which information is to be
used in the assessor’s determination of the ‘‘present
true and actual value . . . of real property used primar-
ily for purposes of producing rental income . . . .’’3
(Emphasis added.) General Statutes (Rev. to 2019) § 12-
63c (a).
On or about April 15, 2020, the defendant’s assessor
bulk mailed notices, along with income and expense
forms pursuant to § 12-63c, to all applicable property
owners (April, 2020 notice and form). With respect to
the plaintiff, however, the court noted that the April,
3
Because the statutory deadline under § 12-63c (a) to submit income and
expense information is June 1, the form must be ‘‘provided’’ to the property
owner by mid-April to meet the forty-five day notice requirement. Section
12-63c (d) provides that, if a property owner does not submit the required
income and expense information by the statutory deadline, the property
owner shall be subject to a 10 percent increase in the assessed value of
such property. In 2020, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Governor Lamont
issued Executive Order No. 7S, § 10, which extended the deadline for submit-
ting the income and expense forms to August 15, 2020. Because August 15,
2020, fell on a Saturday, the deadline was further extended with respect to
applicable properties to August 17, 2020.
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2020 notice and form ‘‘was sent to what the plaintiff
contend[ed] was an outdated address. Although no doc-
umentary evidence was available to verify it, [ESRT]
reported that its address . . . had changed a few years
earlier ([in] 2016), and that it had sent out notices to
that effect, with the implication that the . . . assessor
had been sent such a notification. . . .
‘‘After the required § 12-63c notice and form had been
mailed to [ESRT’s] ‘old’ address, [ESRT] took steps to
correct the address . . . on file with the assessor. This
appears to have been prompted by the forwarding of
a tax bill in late June from the ‘old’ address to ESRT at
its new/current address. As a result, when the assessor
prepared for mailing a reminder notice [and form] to
the taxpayers who had not responded to the original
mailing, the correct (current) address was used. The
assessor provided credible evidence . . . that there
had been a follow-up notice [and form] sent out on or
about August 3, 2020 (as a lesser bulk mailing), sent to
owners who had not yet provided the required . . .
information.4 The plaintiff provided testimony that the
follow-up mailing was first identified as having been
received on August 24, 2020, after the August 17 dead-
line for the submission of the required information.
. . .
‘‘[A]n effort was made to expedite preparation,’’ and,
on September 1, 2020, the plaintiff mailed to the asses-
sor a completed form, but ‘‘delivery of the required
information . . . was too late.’’ (Footnote added; foot-
note omitted.) On January 28, 2021, the assessor
In its principal appellate brief, the plaintiff also claimed that the trial
4

court correctly concluded that the ‘‘reminder’’ mailing from the assessor
directed to the plaintiff at ESRT’s updated address on August 3, 2020, did
not satisfy § 12-63c. At oral argument before this court, the plaintiff’s counsel
acknowledged that this purported claim is not a claim of error. We agree
and, therefore, need not address its merits. See, e.g., Doyle v. Aspen Dental
of Southern CT, PC, 179 Conn. App. 485, 488 n.5, 179 A.3d 249 (2018).
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imposed a penalty on the plaintiff equal to a 10 percent
increase in the assessed value of the property for the
October 1, 2020 grand list pursuant to § 12-63c (d),
for its failure to comply with the statute. The plaintiff
appealed to the Board of Assessment Appeals of the
Town of Greenwich (board), which upheld the asses-
sor’s imposition of a penalty.
Thereafter, the plaintiff appealed from the board’s
decision to the Superior Court, ‘‘claiming that the statu-
tory requirements for imposition of the penalty,’’ specif-
ically, ‘‘the requirement of [forty-five] days in which to
comply—triggered by the assessor providing a suitable
form—ha[d] not been satisfied’’ because, under a strict
construction of the statute, actual receipt was required
for the form to be ‘‘provided,’’ and the plaintiff, through
ESRT, did not actually receive the form until after the
extended deadline. The parties filed cross motions for
summary judgment, which the court, Hon. Edward T.
Krumeich II, judge trial referee, denied.
Following the subsequent court trial, the court, Hon.
Kenneth B. Povodator, judge trial referee, rendered
judgment in favor of the defendant. In its memorandum
of decision, the court rejected the plaintiff’s argument
that § 12-63c should be strictly construed in its favor,
reasoning that this rule of construction was ‘‘primarily
focused on interpreting claimed ambiguities in a stat-
ute,’’ and that Wilton Campus 1691, LLC v. Wilton, 191
Conn. App. 712, 725, 216 A.3d 653 (2019), aff’d, 339
Conn. 157, 260 A.3d 464 (2021), on which the plaintiff
had relied, involved the imposition of a tax, not a pen-
alty. Furthermore, the court noted that our Supreme
Court, in Wilton Campus 1691, LLC v. Wilton, 339
Conn. 157, 177 n.10, 260 A.3d 464 (2021), determined
that General Statutes § 12-55, which governs the publi-
cation of grand lists for assessors’ respective municipal-
ities, was not ambiguous with respect to the issue before
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it and explicitly had reserved opining on whether the
strict construction rule applied to tax penalties.
The court also rejected the plaintiff’s argument that
the defendant failed to comply with § 12-63c in the
present case. The plaintiff argued that, on June 29, 2020,
the assessor had received notice of ESRT’s new
address. The court concluded, however, that the proper
focus was on the ‘‘assessor’s records, on the date that
the original request . . . with the accompanying form
had been sent out [in April, 2020].’’ (Emphasis added.)
The court stated that it was the obligation of the prop-
erty owner, not of the town, to ensure that the assessor
had current information as to its correct mailing
address. The court found that the ‘‘mailing evidence
presented by the [defendant] sufficed to establish, [by]
a preponderance of the evidence . . . that [the asses-
sor] had mailed the materials to the [plaintiff] at its last
known address . . . .’’5 The court concluded that the
assessor sent the required form sufficiently in advance
of the submission deadline and that the ‘‘actual failure
of the [plaintiff] to receive the demand and form was
due to its failure to take reasonable measures to ensure
that the assessor had an accurate up-to-date mailing
address.’’ The court rendered judgment in favor of the
defendant. This appeal followed. Additional facts and
procedural history will be set forth as necessary.
I
The plaintiff first claims that, to the extent that the
word ‘‘provided’’ in § 12-63c (a) is ambiguous, the court
In connection with its second claim, the plaintiff states that ‘‘the uncon-
5

troverted evidence shows that [the April, 2020 correspondence was] not
mailed to the plaintiff’s last known address—[ESRT’s] new office—but
mailed, instead, to [ESRT’s] old office . . . .’’ (Emphasis altered.) This asser-
tion contradicts the court’s determination that the plaintiff’s last known
address, as far as the defendant was aware, was ESRT’s old office, located
on 42nd Street in New York, New York. The plaintiff does not actually claim
on appeal, however, that the court erred in concluding that it failed to prove
that the defendant had learned of ESRT’s new address prior to April, 2020.
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should have construed the statute strictly in its favor.
The plaintiff contends that the phrase ‘‘on a form pro-
vided by the assessor’’ requires that the income and
expense form actually be received by the property
owner. General Statutes (Rev. to 2019) § 12-63c (a).6
The defendant counters that the term ‘‘provided’’ should
not be interpreted to require a property owner’s actual
receipt of the required form and that the plaintiff’s inter-
pretation of § 12-63c (a) is untenable because it would
‘‘[result] in an interpretation of the statute that is both
absurd and unworkable.’’ We agree with the defendant.
Our resolution of this claim requires that we interpret
§ 12-63c (a), which ‘‘presents a legal question over
which our review . . . is plenary. . . . When constru-
ing a statute, [o]ur fundamental objective is to ascertain
and give effect to the apparent intent of the legislature.
. . . In seeking to determine that meaning, General
Statutes § 1-2z directs us first to consider the text of
the statute itself and its relationship to other statutes.
If, after examining such text and considering such rela-
tionship, the meaning of such text is plain and unambig-
uous and does not yield absurd or unworkable results,
extratextual evidence of the meaning of the statute shall
not be considered. . . . It is a basic tenet of statutory
construction that [w]e construe a statute as a whole
Therefore, like the trial court, we refer in this opinion to ESRT’s last known
address as the ‘‘old’’ address.
6
The only authorities cited by the plaintiff in support of its claim that the
income and expense form must actually be received by a property owner
under § 12-63c are two Superior Court decisions. First, in Baker Middletown,
LLC v. Middletown, Docket No. CV-XX-XXXXXXX-S, 2011 WL 6413674, *1
(Conn. Super. September 22, 2023), the court concluded that a taxpayer
must actually receive the form for the assessor to have ‘‘provided’’ the form.
For the reasons set forth in this opinion, we disagree with that conclusion
as a matter of law. Second, Redding Life Care, LLC v. Redding, Docket
No. CV-XX-XXXXXXX-S, 2011 WL 6413764, *1 (Conn. Super. November 30,
2011), is factually distinguishable from the present case because the form
in Redding was not sent to the taxpayer’s last known address but, rather,
to an entirely incorrect address unrelated to the property owner.
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and read its subsections concurrently in order to reach
a reasonable overall interpretation.’’ (Citation omitted;
internal quotation marks omitted.) Rubin v. Brodie, 228
Conn. App. 617, 637, 325 A.3d 1096 (2024).
We begin our analysis with the statute’s plain lan-
guage ‘‘to determine whether, when read in context, it
is susceptible to more than one reasonable interpreta-
tion.’’ (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Wilton Cam-
pus 1691, LLC v. Wilton, supra, 339 Conn. 171. Applying
these principles to § 12-63c, and for the reasons that
follow, we conclude that the plaintiff’s interpretation
of § 12-63c is not consistent with the plain language of
the statute because the word ‘‘provided’’ in § 12-63c (a)
simply means supplied or made available, and does
not impose any specific requirement, contrary to the
plaintiff’s assertions, that assessors must either mail
the income and expense forms in a prescribed manner
or assure actual receipt by some other method.
Section 12-63c establishes the procedures by which a
municipal tax assessor may require an owner of certain
property that is used primarily for the purpose of pro-
ducing rental income to submit income and expense
information for the purpose of conducting a valuation
of that property. Section 12-63c (a) provides in relevant
part: ‘‘In determining the present true and actual value
in any town of real property used primarily for purposes
of producing rental income, the assessor, which term
whenever used in this section shall include assessor or
board of assessors, may require in the conduct of any
appraisal of such property pursuant to the capitalization
of net income method, as provided in section 12-63b,
that the owner of such property annually submit to the
assessor not later than the first day of June, on a form
provided by the assessor not later than forty-five days
before said first day of June, the best available informa-
tion disclosing the actual rental and rental-related
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income and operating expenses applicable to such prop-
erty. . . .’’ (Emphasis added.) General Statutes (Rev.
to 2019) § 12-63c (a). Section 12-63c (d) further provides
in relevant part that any property owner ‘‘required to
submit information to the assessor in accordance with
subsection (a) of this section for any assessment year,
who fails to submit such information as required under
said subsection (a) or who submits information in
incomplete or false form with intent to defraud, shall
be subject to a penalty equal to a ten per cent increase in
the assessed value of such property for such assessment
year. . . .’’ General Statutes (Rev. to 2019) § 12-63c (d).
The key issue in the present appeal, therefore, is the
meaning of the phrase ‘‘on a form provided by the asses-
sor . . . .’’ General Statutes (Rev. to 2019) § 12-63c (a).7

The term ‘‘provided’’ is not defined in § 12-63c. ‘‘In
the absence of a statutory definition, words and phrases
in a particular statute are to be construed according to
their common usage. . . . To ascertain that usage, we
look to the dictionary definition of the term.’’ (Internal
quotation marks omitted.) Rubin v. Brodie, supra, 228
Conn. App. 638–39; see also General Statutes § 1-1 (a).
‘‘We may find evidence of such usage, and technical
meaning, in dictionary definitions, as well as by reading
the statutory language within the context of the broader
legislative scheme.’’ (Internal quotation marks omitted.)
Dorfman v. Liberty Mutual Fire Ins. Co., 227 Conn.
App. 347, 398, 322 A.3d 331 (2024), cert. denied, 351
Conn. 907, 330 A.3d 881 (2025), and cert. denied, 351
Conn. 907, 330 A.3d 882 (2025).

The term ‘‘provide’’ is commonly defined as, inter alia,
‘‘to supply or make available,’’ and ‘‘to make something
available to . . . .’’ Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dic-
tionary (11th Ed. 2003) p. 1001. ‘‘[A]vailable’’ is defined
7
See footnote 1 of this opinion.
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as ‘‘accessible, obtainable . . . .’’8 Id., p. 84. The term
‘‘provide’’ was defined similarly in dictionaries at and
near the time that § 12-63c was amended in 20009 to
add the relevant language that the form containing
income and expense information must be ‘‘provided by
the assessor . . . .’’10 See Public Acts 2000, No. 00-215,
§ 2; see also, e.g., Ledyard v. WMS Gaming, Inc., 338
Conn. 687, 697, 258 A.3d 1268 (2021) (‘‘in the absence of
statutory definitions, we look to the contemporaneous
dictionary definitions of words to ascertain their com-
monly approved usage’’).
Our review of the statutory scheme does not reveal
any indication that the legislature intended for the term
‘‘provided’’ to have any special or technical meaning
in the municipal taxing scheme. See, e.g., Dorfman v.
Liberty Mutual Fire Ins. Co., supra, 227 Conn. App.
400 (‘‘[i]n the absence of any indication that the term
defense as used in [the applicable statute] was intended
8
‘‘[A]ccessible’’ is defined as ‘‘capable of being reached . . . capable of
being used or seen . . . .’’ Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (11th
Ed. 2003) p. 7. ‘‘[O]btain’’ is defined as ‘‘to gain or attain . . . .’’ Id., 857.
The suffix ‘‘-able’’ is defined as ‘‘capable of, fit for, or worthy of . . . .’’ Id.,
3. Reading the definitions of ‘‘obtain’’ and ‘‘-able’’ together, ‘‘obtainable’’ may
be defined as capable of being obtained, gained, or attained.
9
Prior to June 1, 2000, General Statutes (Rev. to 1999) § 12-63c provided
that a property owner shall submit income and expense information to the
assessor ‘‘on a form prescribed by the Secretary of the Office of Policy and
Management or approved in accordance with section 12-61 . . . .’’ That
language was removed, and § 12-63c was amended to include the ‘‘on a form
provided by the assessor’’ language at issue in this appeal. Public Acts 2000,
No. 00-215, § 2. Thus, the statutory language was amended to allow an
assessor to ‘‘provide’’ to a property owner whatever form the assessor
deemed necessary and appropriate, rather than requiring an assessor to use
a specific form ‘‘prescribed’’ by the Secretary of the Office of Policy and
Management.
10
See American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (3rd Ed.
1992) p. 1458 (defining term ‘‘provide’’ as ‘‘[t]o furnish; supply,’’ and ‘‘[t]o
make available; afford’’); Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (10th Ed.
1993) p. 940 (defining ‘‘provide’’ as ‘‘to supply or make available,’’ and ‘‘to
make something available to’’); Oxford American Dictionary and Language
Guide (1999) p. 802 (defining term ‘‘provide’’ as to ‘‘supply; furnish’’).
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to have a technical or special meaning . . . we see no
reason to depart from our regular practice of looking to
the common usage of a term as defined in dictionaries’’
(citation omitted; internal quotation marks omitted)).
Thus, in the absence of any indication that the word
‘‘provided’’ was intended to impose specific require-
ments on assessors with respect to how they must make
the income and expense forms available to property
owners, we decline to add any such requirements onto
the clear statutory language.
The fact that the assessor has discretion with respect
to the manner in which it may provide the income and
expense forms does not render the term ‘‘provided’’
ambiguous because it is not plausible, given that word’s
ordinary meaning, that the term ‘‘provided’’ encom-
passes the distinct concepts of actual delivery and/or
receipt. See Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary
(11th Ed. 2003) p. 1038 (defining ‘‘receive’’ as ‘‘to come
into possession of; acquire’’ (emphasis added)); see
also, e.g., Ajdini v. Frank Lill & Son, Inc., 349 Conn.
1, 3, 5–7, 312 A.3d 579 (2024) (concluding that term
‘‘file’’ in General Statutes § 31-294c (b) unambiguously
meant to ‘‘deliver,’’ which required actual ‘‘receipt’’ and,
therefore, employer did not meet its statutory obligation
to ‘‘file’’ notice of intention to contest liability to pay
compensation for employee’s workers’ compensation
claim by placing notice in mail within statutory period).
Although assessors may choose to provide such forms
by means other than by a regular mailing, such as by
certified mail, return receipt requested, the text of § 12-
63c ‘‘does not command that level of specificity.’’ Rubin
v. Brodie, supra, 228 Conn. App. 639–40.
It is not for this court to add provisions to a statute.
See, e.g., Cochran v. Dept. of Transportation, 350 Conn.
844, 865–66, 327 A.3d 901 (2024) (‘‘[i]t is not the role
of this court to engraft additional requirements onto
clear statutory language’’ (internal quotation marks
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Greenwich Retail, LLC v. Greenwich

omitted)); High Watch Recovery Center, Inc. v. Dept.
of Public Health, 347 Conn. 317, 333, 297 A.3d 531 (2023)
(‘‘[i]n the absence of express language in [a statute]
mandating that [a] request . . . take a particular form
or include certain talismanic language, we will not read
any such requirement into the statute’’). Indeed, courts
‘‘must construe a statute as written. . . . Courts may
not by construction supply omissions . . . or add
exceptions merely because it appears that good reasons
exist for adding them. . . . It is axiomatic that the
court itself cannot rewrite a statute to accomplish a
particular result. That is a function of the legislature.’’
(Internal quotation marks omitted.) Blondeau v. Bal-
tierra, 337 Conn. 127, 143, 252 A.3d 317 (2020). Accord-
ingly, we decline to add to the statute the requirement
that an income and expense form ‘‘provided by the
assessor’’ must be received by the property owner.
Rather, we assume that, if the legislature intended that
an assessor be required to demonstrate that an income
and expense information form was, in fact, actually
delivered to and/or received by a property owner under
§ 12-63c, it would have stated that requirement
expressly.11 See, e.g., Costanzo v. Plainfield, 344 Conn.
11
We note that, after our Supreme Court released its decision in Seramonte
Associates, LLC v. Hamden, 345 Conn. 76, 78, 282 A.3d 1253 (2022), in
which it concluded that the term ‘‘submit,’’ in reference to a property owner’s
duty to submit income and expense information to their municipal tax
assessor within the statutory deadline, was not satisfied when that informa-
tion was postmarked but not delivered by that date, our legislature amended
§ 12-63c to add subsection (e), which provides: ‘‘Any income and expense
disclosure form described in subsection (a) of this section received by the
assessor to which such form is due that is in an envelope bearing a postmark,
as defined in section 1-2a, showing a date within the allowed filing period,
shall not be deemed delinquent.’’ General Statutes § 12-63c (e), codifying
Public Acts 2023, No. 23-152, § 1. By doing so, our legislature has now stated
that a property owner’s posting of an income and expense form within the
allowed filing period, as evidenced by a postmark, is sufficient if the form
does not arrive to the assessor by the statutory deadline.
Notably, however, the legislature has maintained, consistent with our
Supreme Court’s holding in Seramonte Associates, LLC, that the income
and expense disclosure form must in fact be ‘‘received by the assessor
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86, 108, 277 A.3d 772 (2022) (‘‘[i]t is a well settled princi-
ple of statutory construction that the legislature knows
how to convey its intent expressly . . . or to use
broader or limiting terms when it chooses to do so’’
(internal quotation marks omitted)).
Furthermore, our review of related statutes supports
our conclusion that the term ‘‘provided’’ in § 12-63c (a)
should not be equated to actual receipt. ‘‘[I]n determin-
ing the meaning of a statute . . . we look not only at
the provision at issue, but also to the broader statutory
scheme to ensure the coherency of our construction.’’
(Internal quotation marks omitted.) 9 Pettipaug, LLC
v. Planning & Zoning Commission, 349 Conn. 268, 289,
316 A.3d 318 (2024). Section 12-63c is part of chapter
203 of the General Statutes, which governs property
tax assessments. Chapter 203 is, in turn, part of title
12 of the General Statutes, our legislature’s pervasive
statutory tax scheme; see, e.g., Danbury v. Dana Invest-
ment Corp., 249 Conn. 1, 20, 730 A.2d 1128 (1999) (citing
§ 12-63c in support of proposition that process by which
plaintiff city assesses real estate is authorized and regu-
lated by ‘‘pervasive statutory scheme’’ and stating that
procedures by which taxpayer may challenge those
assessments are set forth by statutory scheme that care-
fully balances procedural and substantive remedies);
pursuant to which the duties of assessors are ‘‘pre-
scribed with particularity. The manner in which real
. . . .’’ (Emphasis added.) General Statutes § 12-63c (e). Moreover, in amend-
ing § 12-63c in this regard, the legislature did not also amend subsection
(a) in a way relevant here or change the language at issue in the present
case. ‘‘[W]hen changes have been introduced by amendment to a statute,
the presumed change does not go any further than that which is expressly
declared or necessarily implied. . . . We cannot impute to the legislature
. . . in the absence of an intent clearly expressed in the [statute], [an intent]
to enact [a statute that] involves a departure from existing statutory law.’’
(Internal quotation marks omitted.) Gaida v. Planning & Zoning Commis-
sion, 108 Conn. App. 19, 25, 947 A.2d 361, cert. denied, 289 Conn. 922, 958
A.2d 150 (2008), and cert. denied, 289 Conn. 923, 958 A.2d 151 (2008).
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estate is to be described and assessed is explicitly set
out.’’ Empire Estates, Inc. v. Stamford, 147 Conn. 262,
264, 159 A.2d 812 (1960). Assessors’ activities also are
heavily regulated. See generally §§ 12-62f-1 through 12-
62f-6 of the Regulations of Connecticut State Agencies.
In light of this comprehensive scheme, we decline to
read into § 12-63c any specific requirement that asses-
sors actually deliver, rather than provide or make avail-
able, income and expense forms to property owners.
Moreover, we note that General Statutes § 12-39bb12
provides in relevant part that ‘‘[r]ecords of the Depart-
ment of Revenue Services may be provided in the form
of written documents, reproductions of such docu-
ments, films or photoimpressions, or electronically pro-
duced tapes, disks or records, or by any other mode
or means which the commissioner determines neces-
sary or appropriate. . . .’’ (Emphasis added.) Our
reading of the term ‘‘provided’’ in § 12-63c (a) is consis-
tent with the statutory requirements of § 12-39bb.
In several other taxing statutes, however, the legisla-
ture has required municipal assessors to send relevant
information to taxpayers by certified mail, return
receipt requested, by mail, or by other specified meth-
ods. See, e.g., General Statutes § 12-53 (c) (1) (assessor
may perform audit by giving notice in writing to owner
that ‘‘shall be placed in the hands of such person or
left at such person’s usual place of residence or business
or shall be sent to such person by registered or certified
mail at the last-known place of residence’’). Moreover,
in some situations, it has evinced its expectation of
actual delivery. See, e.g., General Statutes § 12-120b (b)
(‘‘A claimant negatively affected by a decision of the
Secretary of the Office of Policy and Management . . .
12
Section 12-39bb, which is contained within chapter 202 of the General
Statutes, titled ‘‘Collection of State Taxes,’’ governs the collection of state
taxes, and specifically delineates the ways in which the Department of
Revenue Services may ‘‘provide’’ its records.
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may appeal such decision . . . . The date of any notice
sent by the secretary pursuant to this section shall be
deemed to be the date the notice is delivered to the
claimant.’’ (Emphasis added.)). The legislature has not
done so in the present case, which suggests its intent
that actual delivery or receipt is not required. See, e.g.,
State v. Cody M., 337 Conn. 92, 103, 259 A.3d 576 (2020)
(‘‘[when] a statute, with reference to one subject con-
tains a given provision, the omission of such provision
from a similar statute concerning a related subject . . .
is significant to show that a different intention existed’’
(internal quotation marks omitted)).
In the present case, the plaintiff argues that we should
not construe § 12-63c as allowing for the mailing of
forms to a property owner’s last known address to be
an acceptable manner for an assessor to meet its burden
to provide the relevant forms. We disagree. Section 12-
63c does not require that an assessor use the United
States mail to provide the required forms. Indeed, if the
legislature wanted to mandate that the assessor mail
the form under § 12-63c, it would have so specified.
See, e.g., General Statutes § 12-53a (e) (upon receipt of
notice from assessor, tax collector of town shall, if such
notice is received after normal billing date, within thirty
days thereafter ‘‘mail or hand a bill to the owner’’
(emphasis added)); General Statutes § 12-233 (a) (2)
(‘‘[a] notice of deficiency assessment may be mailed
to the taxpayer at any time’’ in case of failure to file
return or deficiency due to fraud (emphasis added)).
Instead, we view such statutes as providing proce-
dural protections in favor of taxpayers who are obli-
gated to send information or documents to state and
municipal tax authorities. For example, General Stat-
utes § 12-41 (f) allows for the imposition of a penalty
if a taxpayer fails to file a declaration of personal prop-
erty but provides that any declaration of personal prop-
erty ‘‘received by the municipality to which it is due
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that is in an envelope bearing a postmark . . . showing
a date within the allowed filing period shall not be
deemed to be delinquent.’’ See also General Statutes
§ 12-42 (a) (declaration or extension request may be
filed or postmarked next business day following sub-
mission deadline); General Statutes § 12-146 (no tax
shall be construed to be delinquent if such tax was paid
through municipal electronic payment service within
time allowed by statute or if envelope containing
amount due, ‘‘as received by the tax collector of the
municipality to which such tax is payable, bears a post-
mark showing a date within the time allowed by stat-
ute’’). Thus, if the legislature intended to require asses-
sors to provide the income and expense forms in a
specific manner, it would have stated that requirement
expressly. See, e.g., Stone v. East Coast Swappers, LLC,
337 Conn. 589, 606, 255 A.3d 851 (2020) (‘‘when the
legislature chooses to act, it is presumed to know how
to draft legislation consistent with its intent and to
know of all other existing statutes’’ (internal quotation
marks omitted)).
Moreover, we agree with the defendant that the plain-
tiff’s interpretation would yield absurd or unworkable
results. Our Supreme Court has interpreted § 1-2z to
‘‘instruct Connecticut’s courts, when construing statu-
tory language, to eschew those interpretations that,
although not literally impossible to effectuate, would
be so bizarre, impracticable, or contrary to common
sense that one cannot reasonably assume that they
reflect the considered intent of the legislature.’’ NEMS,
PLLC v. Harvard Pilgrim Health Care of Connecticut,
Inc., 350 Conn. 525, 546, 325 A.3d 196 (2024); see also
Cohen v. Rossi, 346 Conn. 642, 700, 295 A.3d 75 (2023)
(Ecker, J., concurring in part and concurring in the
judgment) (‘‘the threshold ambiguity analysis under § 1-
2z should and must take into account . . . common-
sense, practical considerations regarding how the statu-
tory scheme will operate in the real world’’). Under the
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plaintiff’s interpretation, a municipal assessor would
be tasked with making sure a rental property owner’s
address is correct in each assessment period—769 prop-
erties in the present case—which would present a
nearly impossible administrative burden for municipali-
ties. See part II of this opinion.
A construction of the term ‘‘provided’’ as meaning
made available, but not necessarily actually received,
properly requires an eligible property owner, who is in
the best position to know its current mailing address,
to update its mailing address with the relevant tax asses-
sor to avoid a penalty under § 12-63c, which is consis-
tent with the allocation of that affirmative burden in
our case law. See PJM & Associates, LC v. Bridgeport,
292 Conn. 125, 142–43, 971 A.2d 24 (2009) (placing bur-
den on property owner to provide or make available
information). We therefore decline to conclude that the
assessor should shoulder the burden of verifying each
property owner’s address. Cf., e.g., United Illuminating
Co. v. New Haven, 240 Conn. 422, 434, 692 A.2d 742
(1997) (‘‘It is well settled that it is the responsibility of
the taxpayer to provide the assessor with sufficient
facts to value personal property for tax purposes. . . .
It is a self-reporting system by practical necessity,
because it simply would be too burdensome on munici-
pal assessors to locate, identify and value all of the
taxable personal property in their environs.’’ (Citation
omitted; internal quotation marks omitted.)). As prop-
erty owners are the parties with the greatest ability to
prevent the risk of a miscommunication regarding an
address change, we conclude that the burden lies appro-
priately with property owners to provide the relevant
municipality with information regarding their most up-
to-date addresses. This is particularly so when property
owners rely on property managers, whose addresses
also may change, for the administration of their tax
obligations.
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Our conclusion is consistent with the overall statu-
tory scheme. Section 12-63c (a) has granted assessors
the express power to require the submission of income
and expense forms by property owners by ‘‘provid[ing]’’
such forms, and they necessarily have been conferred
certain secondary, implied powers with respect to the
exact method by which the relevant forms are ‘‘pro-
vided.’’ See United Illuminating Co. v. New Haven,
supra, 240 Conn. 439, 458 (explaining that, although
municipality only has powers of taxation expressly
granted to it by legislature, assessors have implied pow-
ers as public officials that are necessary to proper exe-
cution of duties because, ‘‘[w]hen a general power is
given to a municipal officer, whatever is necessary for
effective exercise of that power is, in the absence of
express authority, conferred by implication’’ (internal
quotation marks omitted)).
As previously stated, if the legislature wanted to add
an explicit requirement of actual receipt into § 12-63c
(a), it would have done so. Because it has not, we
decline to read into the statute words that are not stated
therein. Accordingly, because we conclude that the
term ‘‘provided’’ in § 12-63c (a) is plain and unambigu-
ous and simply means to be made available, and
because the plaintiff’s interpretation would yield absurd
and unworkable results, we decline to consult extratex-
tual sources of legislative intent, consistent with § 1-
2z. The plaintiff’s claim that the statute is ambiguous,
therefore, is unavailing.13
II
The plaintiff’s second claim is that the trial court
incorrectly determined that the April, 2020 notice and
13
Consistent with our Supreme Court’s recent decision in Wilton Campus
1691, LLC v. Wilton, supra, 339 Conn. 177 n.10, because we conclude that
the term ‘‘provided’’ in § 12-63c (a) is unambiguous, we do not consider
‘‘whether the maxim that this court resolves any ambiguities . . . in favor
of the taxpayer applies . . . .’’
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form mailed to the plaintiff by the assessor satisfied
§ 12-63c (a). Specifically, the plaintiff argues, inter alia,
that the court (1) incorrectly determined that the plain-
tiff failed to take reasonable measures to ensure that
the assessor had an up-to-date mailing address, and
(2) improperly read into § 12-63c a provision that an
assessor’s request and form for income and expense
information ‘‘may properly be mailed to a property own-
er’s last known address . . . .’’14 (Emphasis omitted.)
The defendant counters that the trial court properly
rejected the notion that § 12-63c requires actual receipt
of income and expense forms by the taxpayer.15 We
conclude that the court correctly determined that the
14
In support of its second claim, the plaintiff again argues that the court
should have determined that the term ‘‘provided’’ requires actual receipt by
the property owner. In part I of this opinion, we have rejected the plaintiff’s
contention that the assessor’s obligation under § 12-63c (a) to provide the
form requires that a property owner actually receive it. As stated previously
in this opinion, the fact that the plaintiff did not actually receive the form
does not negate the statutory sufficiency of the assessor’s April 15, 2020
mailing. We need not revisit that issue again here.
15
The defendant further argues that ‘‘the trial court properly applied the
mailbox rule . . . .’’ Although we agree that the court properly construed
§ 12-63c, we disagree with the defendant that this case implicates the mailbox
rule. Indeed, the court did not apply the mailbox rule in its memorandum
of decision. The mailbox rule is a common-law rebuttable presumption
providing that, ‘‘if a letter is mailed to the correct address with the correct
postage, it is presumed it was received.’’ E. Prescott, Tait’s Handbook of
Connecticut Evidence (6th Ed. 2019) § 3.8.1, p. 133. Such presumptions may
be rebutted, however, with substantial countervailing evidence, namely,
evidence that the letter was not, in fact, received. Id.
In the present case, the court found that the plaintiff did not receive the
April, 2020 mailing containing the appropriate statutory forms. The court
stated: ‘‘[T]he court finds that the assessor did send out the required demand
for [income and expense] information and associated form sufficiently in
advance of the due date . . . but that the actual failure of the taxpayer to
receive the demand and form was due to its failure to take reasonable
measures to ensure that the assessor had an accurate, up-to-date mailing
address.’’ (Emphasis added.) Our determination that the mailbox rule does
not apply to the facts of this case, however, is not dispositive of our holding
that the assessor complied with § 12-63c, because, as we stated in part I of
this opinion, actual receipt of the ‘‘form provided by the assessor’’ is not
required by § 12-63c (a).
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way in which the assessor provided the forms to the
plaintiff in the present case complied with § 12-63c (a).
The following additional facts are relevant to our
resolution of this claim. In 2016, ESRT moved its offices
from 42nd Street to 33rd Street in New York, New York.
With respect to the address change, Rodney Gomes,
senior vice president and chief controller of ESRT, testi-
fied: ‘‘I’m assuming that, in 2016, when we alerted all
of our lenders, and I can’t give you a copy of anything,
but that this would’ve been one of our vendors, would’ve
been in our database, and we would’ve sent a notice
changing the address back then.’’ (Emphasis added.)
At trial, the defendant offered into evidence an affidavit
of Eric Hyland, a mailing specialist with Quality Data
Service, Inc. (QDS), in which he averred that QDS had
been contracted to prepare and mail demands for
annual statements of income and expenses pursuant
to § 12-63c. He averred that the assessor’s mailing list
provided to QDS for the October 1, 2020 grand list
contained 769 properties, and that QDS delivered the
bulk mailing to the United States Postal Service on April
14, 2020. Along with Hyland’s affidavit, proof of the
bulk mailing, including the mailing to the plaintiff’s last
known address, was admitted into evidence.
The court found that, ‘‘[a]lthough no documentary
evidence was available to verify it, the property man-
ager [had testified] that [ESRT’s] address (mailing
address) had changed a few years earlier ([in] 2016),
and that [ESRT] had sent out notices to that effect, with
the implication that the . . . assessor had been sent
such a notification.’’ (Emphasis added.) The court noted
that there was evidence that there had been a ‘‘univer-
sal’’ mailing to everyone associated with ESRT to pro-
vide notification of the 2016 address change. The court
found, however, that, ‘‘[a]bsent documentation and
absent testimony providing details of the documenta-
tion sent out, there is an inherent uncertainty of the
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level of specificity in such a broad mailing as might be
needed for this particular situation.’’ (Emphasis added.)
The court further noted that, although a universal notifi-
cation may be sufficient for ‘‘bilateral relationships
between ESRT and others,’’ when acting as a represen-
tative of a third party, such as the plaintiff in the present
case, ‘‘a more detailed recitation likely would be needed,
to ensure that the recipient of the notice is made aware
that the communication is intended to inform the recipi-
ent of a change of contact information for a principal.’’
The court found that the evidence presented by the
assessor of its mailing established that she had mailed
the materials to the plaintiff at its last known address.
The court ultimately concluded that the plaintiff had
the obligation to provide an accurate address to the
assessor and declined to credit the plaintiff’s evidence
claiming to the contrary.
We apply plenary review to the question of whether
the trial court correctly determined that the April, 2020
mailing satisfied § 12-63c. ‘‘Once we ascertain the mean-
ing of the statute, the application of that standard to
the undisputed historical facts in determining whether
the town complied with the statutory requirements is
a mixed question of fact and law, over which our review
is plenary.’’ (Internal quotation marks omitted.) 9 Petti-
paug, LLC v. Planning & Zoning Commission, supra,
349 Conn. 278.
We address the plaintiff’s arguments in turn. First,
the plaintiff asserts that the court incorrectly deter-
mined that the plaintiff failed to take reasonable mea-
sures to ensure that the assessor had an up-to-date
mailing address. Although the plaintiff’s counsel stated
at oral argument before this court that the question of
‘‘what is meant by the word provided’’ was a ‘‘pure
question of law,’’ the plaintiff asserts in its brief that
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the court’s finding that the plaintiff ‘‘failed to take rea-
sonable measures to ensure that the assessor had an
up-to-date mailing address’’ is ‘‘both factually incorrect
and legally without basis.’’ The plaintiff does not cite
to any legal authority in support of its argument. The
plaintiff has attempted to recast this claim as a legal
challenge to the defendant’s compliance with § 12-63c;
however, it is ‘‘essentially attacking the underlying fac-
tual findings made by the [court].’’ Generation Part-
ners, L.P. v. Mandell, 148 Conn. App. 294, 301, 85 A.3d
49 (2014). Although the plaintiff has pointed to the testi-
mony of its witnesses that notice of its new address
was ‘‘provided in a massive mailing to all of its vendors,
tenants and anyone with which it did business or
required a filing,’’ the trial court deemed that evidence
to be uncertain and speculative, and we will not revisit
the court’s determinations regarding the weight of that
evidence. See, e.g., Reserve Realty, LLC v. Windemere
Reserve, LLC, 346 Conn. 391, 413–14, 291 A.3d 64 (2023)
(‘‘[b]ecause it is the trial court’s function to weigh the
evidence and determine credibility, we give great defer-
ence to its findings’’ (internal quotation marks omit-
ted)).
In part I of this opinion, we have concluded that the
assessor ‘‘provided’’ the form to the property owner
within the meaning of § 12-63c through its bulk mailing.
The plaintiff has not challenged the court’s finding that
the assessor mailed the forms to all applicable property
owners, including the plaintiff, albeit to ESRT’s old
address, on April 15, 2020. As the assessor ‘‘provided’’
the forms upon mailing, the court correctly determined
that the assessor’s April 15, 2020 bulk mailing satisfied
the requirements of § 12-63c (a).
Moreover, the evidence presented at trial with respect
to the procedures that the defendant followed in send-
ing the ‘‘bulk mailing’’ demonstrated that they were
consistent with the statutory and regulatory taxing
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scheme. General Statutes § 12-64 (a) provides in rele-
vant part: ‘‘Any interest in real estate shall be set by
the assessors in the list of the person in whose name
the title to such interest stands on the land records.
. . .’’ (Emphasis added.) General Statutes § 12-62f (b)
provides in relevant part that the secretary of the Office
of Policy and Management shall develop ‘‘minimum
standards for the certification of a computer-assisted
mass appraisal system and adopt regulations . . . set-
ting minimum computer-assisted mass appraisal revalu-
ation standards and computerized administrative stan-
dards. . . .’’ Accordingly, §§ 12-62f-1 through 12-62f-6
of the Regulations of Connecticut State Agencies com-
prehensively regulate and define the minimum stan-
dards for computer assisted mass appraisals and charge
municipalities with having the capacity to allow for
inquiries and updating of real estate records, including
addresses.16 These regulations have the same force and
effect of law as the taxing statutes and they reinforce
the statute’s plain language. See, e.g., PJM & Associates
v. Bridgeport, supra, 292 Conn. 135–36 (concluding that
§ 12-62i-4 (a) of Regulations of Connecticut State Agen-
cies supported plain meaning of § 12-63c (a), which
grants assessors power to require submission of income
and expense reports in years in which there was no
16
See, e.g., Regs., Conn. State Agencies § 12-62f-3 (a) (1) (providing for
maintenance of data management module that shall contain, with respect
to real property, current property owner and mailing address); Regs., Conn.
State Agencies § 12-62f-5 (providing for assessment administration module,
pursuant to which assessors must have ability to allow inquiries and updating
of real estate records); Regs., Conn. State Agencies § 12-62f-6 (providing
that assessor’s tax collection module shall have ability to process new owner
and address changes prior to tax billing); see also Regs., Conn. State Agencies
§ 12-728 (b)-1 (a) (‘‘A notice of deficiency shall set forth the reason for the
proposed assessment, and shall be mailed to the taxpayer’s last known
address, as shown in the records of the [d]epartment. It is the responsibility
of the taxpayer, or of the taxpayer’s legal representative, to give written
notification to the [c]ommissioner of any change of address, status or
circumstances, and such notification shall be received by the [c]ommis-
sioner prior to the date of any notice of deficiency.’’ (Emphasis added.)).
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revaluation of properties). Thus, although assessors are
charged with maintaining systems that comply with this
statutory and regulatory scheme, they are not obligated
to update proactively the addresses of every property
owner within the purview of § 12-63c, in the absence
of being notified of such a change by the owner. Such
basic information is part and parcel of a taxpayer’s
duty to ‘‘furnish the facts [on] which valuations may be
based. . . . If he fails to do so, the assessors are only
required to act [on] the best information [they] can
obtain . . . and the taxpayer cannot justly complain if
the assessors, acting in good faith, make an error in
judgment in listing and valuing his property.’’ (Citations
omitted; internal quotation marks omitted.) Northeast
Datacom, Inc. v. Wallingford, 212 Conn. 639, 649, 563
A.2d 688 (1989); see also Xerox Corp. v. Board of Tax
Review, 240 Conn. 192, 205, 690 A.2d 389 (1997) (tax-
payer bears burden of supplying information that pro-
vides ‘‘the facts [on] which valuations may be based’’
(emphasis omitted; internal quotation marks omitted)).
Second, the plaintiff argues that the court improperly
read into § 12-63c a provision that an assessor’s request
and form for income and expense information ‘‘may
properly be mailed to a property owner’s last known
address . . . .’’ (Emphasis omitted.) Relying on the fact
that other statutes require that information must be
sent to a taxpayer’s ‘‘last known address,’’ the plaintiff
asserts that, because § 12-63c does not contain language
requiring that the income and expense form be mailed
to a property owner’s last known address, the assessor
could not rely on the plaintiff’s last known address and,
instead, should have ensured that the plaintiff actually
received the form. To the contrary, we read such stat-
utes as being in the nature of a procedural shield to
protect taxpayers to ensure that relevant notices are
sent to their most recently updated addresses. See, e.g.,
General Statutes § 12-55 (in case of any increase in
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valuation of property, assessor or board of assessors
‘‘shall mail a written notice of assessment increase to
the last-known address of the owner of the property
the valuation of which has increased’’); General Statutes
§ 12-60 (written notice of increase shall be sent to per-
son’s last known address); General Statutes § 12-89
(upon denial of exemption, assessor shall mail written
notice of such denial to last known address of taxpayer
or organization); General Statutes § 12-115 (board of
assessment appeals shall mail to owner at ‘‘last-known
address of the owner, postage paid . . . a written or
printed notice to appear’’). The absence of this language
from § 12-63c, however, does not support an inference
that it was impermissible for the assessor to provide
the form by mailing it to the plaintiff’s last known
address. By doing so, the assessor ‘‘provided’’ the form
pursuant to § 12-63c (a) by making it available to the
plaintiff using the most current information that she
had concerning the plaintiff’s mailing address. As stated
in part I of this opinion, the unambiguous language of
§ 12-63c (a) requires nothing further. Accordingly, we
conclude that the court correctly determined that the
mailing by the defendant’s assessor, which was sent at
least forty-five days before the statutory deadline to the
plaintiff’s last known address, satisfied the require-
ments of § 12-63c (a).
The judgment is affirmed.
In this opinion the other judges concurred.