Peadar Davis - Competence Crisis and Technological Advancements

A conversation with Peadar Davis reveals how modern assessment systems must balance technical precision with public trust

The Revenue Dilemma Nobody Wants to Talk About

Here's an uncomfortable truth we all know but rarely discuss openly: civilization costs money. As Peadar Davis puts it bluntly in our recent conversation, "You got to get money from somewhere."

Yet in jurisdictions worldwide, property tax, arguably our most efficient and fair revenue mechanism, faces constant political headwinds. The disconnect between what we know works and what actually gets implemented reveals a fundamental challenge in our profession that goes well beyond technical competence.

When Perfect Valuations Aren't Enough

Davis, a chartered surveyor turned academic who's worked everywhere from Northern Ireland to Cairo, offers a sobering perspective on assessment accuracy. "People get overly caught up in the absolute accuracy," he notes, "because ultimately it's a relative sharing mechanism."

This insight cuts to the heart of a professional paradox many of us face. We can build sophisticated mass appraisal models, deploy cutting-edge technology, and achieve remarkable precision in our valuations. But if taxpayers don't trust the system or see where their money goes, technical excellence becomes almost irrelevant.

The most striking example comes from Rwanda, where recent administrations forgave all property tax arrears. "If you see that happen," Davis observes, "then you'll never pay your property tax again until somebody comes and forces you to."

Building Systems That Actually Work

For assessors working in challenging environments, whether that's a jurisdiction with limited sales data or one facing political resistance, Davis advocates for pragmatic approaches over theoretical purity. His comparison of point-based and banded systems offers valuable perspective:

Point systems, often built on floor area measurements, offer simplicity: "If you can measure up for a carpet, you can get a tax base." Combined with easily identifiable exterior attributes and location factors, they provide a workable solution when transaction data is sparse.

Banded systems, while "far blunter," offer administrative advantages. With only a handful of different bills to process, collection and enforcement become dramatically simpler, a crucial consideration in jurisdictions with limited administrative capacity.

The key insight? "It's a sharing mechanism and you need to get a tax base in place and then exploit it rather than worrying about purity of the approach."

The Missing Link: Closing the Communication Loop

Perhaps Davis's most important observation concerns what happens after assessment and collection. "Once you've got the revenue... you've got to be able to spend it in a way which people can see benefits."

This closes a critical loop that many jurisdictions fail to complete. It's not enough to assess fairly, bill efficiently, and collect effectively. The public needs to see tangible results, not just expenditure numbers, but "successful educational outcomes or street lights put into areas."

Davis points to a stark example from Northern Ireland, where water infrastructure has deteriorated to the point where "virtually the entire country, it's effectively illegal to develop." The irony? Resistance to water charges means the infrastructure is actually being subsidized by taxpayers across the Irish Sea, "people who are no more wealthy" but who understand the connection between taxes paid and services received.

The Knowledge Transfer Challenge

As experienced assessors retire in unprecedented numbers, Davis sees both crisis and opportunity. The traditional apprenticeship model of knowledge transfer is breaking down, but technology offers new pathways.

His experience in Northern Ireland during their mass appraisal implementation provides a model: bringing together final-year students, seasoned valuers, and statisticians for joint training. This approach gives technical students "appraisal manners" while helping traditional valuers embrace new methodologies.

"We're going to get people in the industry who probably envisaged that they were going to be making the next great big computer game," Davis suggests. The challenge is channeling their technical skills while teaching them "the sensibilities of dealing with taxpayers and the whole legal review process."

Key Takeaways

For Assessors: Focus on building systems that work in your specific context rather than chasing theoretical perfection. Whether using points, bands, or full market value, the goal is creating a fair, understandable sharing mechanism.

For Leadership: Investment in administrative capacity, discovery, assessment, billing, collection, and enforcement, matters as much as valuation accuracy. But don't stop there. Close the loop by demonstrating how revenue translates into community benefits.

For the Profession: We must become better advocates for our work. As Davis notes, "Somebody needs to pick that argument up and give policymakers and politicians the counter arguments." The technical excellence we pursue means nothing if we can't articulate why property tax remains essential to functioning communities.

The conversation with Davis ultimately reveals that our greatest challenge isn't technical, it's human. Building trust, demonstrating value, and maintaining competence across generational transitions requires us to think beyond algorithms and ratios. In a world where "ability to pay is way in excess of willingness to pay," our success depends not just on what we assess, but on how well we connect those assessments to the communities we serve.