Happy New Year! It’s January and 2018 promises to be filled with important activity. First, our federal oversight agency, the Appraisal Subcommittee will visit us in early February to complete their biennial audit. Their last two visits have resulted in a clean audit with no findings and we expect the same this year as well.
October has just concluded and November is here. This is always an exciting time with the World Series (How about those Astros!?), Halloween and Dia de Los Muertos, and the beginning of deer hunting season in Texas. October 31 also closes our State Employee Charitable Campaign month, with new highs reached each year for generosity by our team members.
The Board met on August 14th for its regular quarterly meeting. Because of the number of bills that passed during the 2017 legislative session affecting the agency’s license holders and the agency’s operations, a large number of draft rules were proposed. Several Agreed Orders, a modification and a Proposal for Decision (PFD) arising out of a case heard at the State Office of Administrative Hearings (SOAH), extended the agenda. We heard quarterly reports from our Commissioner, directors, and major committees.
As the Board and its staff get prepared for its next meeting on Monday, August 14th, I am pleased to tell you that the summer has been very productive. All of the agency teams are handling very high volumes of matters, even with daily staff numbers reduced due to summer vacations. Despite this, the teams are keeping up with demand, but not as many or as quickly as we want. 
SB 1516 amends Chapter 1104 to address some recent changes in federal law regarding the regulation of AMCs, to provide consistency in terminology, and to repeal some outdated provisions. The bill also makes some conforming changes to align Chapter 1104 with the amendments made last session to Chapter 1103, the appraiser licensing act administered by the Board.
The Texas Appraiser Licensing and Certification Board (TALCB) is pleased to announce an important win for consumers in Texas. On April 6, 2017, former real estate appraiser Robert Chandler Smith, Jr. (Smith) pled guilty in Travis County District Court to felony charges of false statement to obtain property or credit. As a result, the Court placed Smith on six years of community supervision, imposed a fine and prohibited him from performing real estate appraisals. This criminal prosecution protects Texas consumers from Smith’s illegal and deceptive appraisal activities.
TALCB is pleased to announce the Senate confirmation of Governor Abbott's appointments of eight TALCB board members on May 16, 2017.
Chair, Jamie Wickliffe of Midlothian, Vice-Chair, James Jefferies of Georgetown, Clayton Black of Stanton, Chance Bolton of Austin, Tony Peña of Lubbock, Martha Gayle Reid Lynch of El Paso, Alejandro Sostre-Odio of San Antonio, Joyce Yannuzzi of New Braunfels.
TALCB is pleased to announce the results of the 2017 Appraiser and AMC Fee Survey. TALCB engaged the Hobby School of Public Affairs at the University of Houston and the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University to conduct a survey to learn more about the practices of appraisers and appraisal management companies (AMCs) that operate in the state of Texas. A total of 1,038 appraisers and 59 appraisal management companies doing business in the state of Texas participated in the survey.
You may have heard about or read an article published in the Spring 2017 edition of Appraisal Buzz magazine entitled “When You Get Notice of a State Complaint”. This article discusses the complaint process in general and what to consider if you receive a complaint about your appraisal practice. Near the beginning of the article, reference is made to residential appraisers in Texas having “roughly one in six” odds of a complaint being filed against them with the Texas Appraiser Licensing and Certification Board during “one particularly busy year”.