By JOHN THOMPSON
Coweta Editor

Wingo Avery will have to wait a little longer to find out if he has to pay $25,000 in taxes and penalties after the Coweta County Commission took no action on his tax relief question Tuesday.

The commission debated for more than an hour on Avery's unique situation. Avery owned 229 acres on Old Atlanta Highway and used it as farm land. In 1994, he put the tract into the Conservation Use Valuation Assessment program, which stipulates a landowner must use his land for at least 10 years as agricultural property.

In return, the landowner receives a significant break on his property taxes. If the land is sold or the landowner uses the property for another use, he has to pay the amount he's saved on taxes plus a 100 percent penalty.

Avery's attorney, Theo Mann, told the commission that his client had experienced numerous health problems and decided that he could no longer deal with the hard work of farming or leasing out the property and overseeing the agricultural operation.

He sold the property in July, 1997 and received a notice from the Coweta County Tax Assessor's office that he owed $25,000 since he had breached the contract under the conservation program.

Commissioner Vernon "Mutt" Hunter, who helped start the program, said the law was originally created to help the farmer, and the penalty was added to keep people from using the law for land speculation.

Mann added that a provision of the law stipulated that serious medical conditions could prevent the penalty from being charged, but the commissioners and County Attorney Mitch Powell said the law was very vague.

This is the first time the county has had an appeal, and commissioner Lawrence Nelms said he would abstain from any votes until he heard an opinion from the Attorney General's office.

"Five of us on the county commission are trying to decide what 450 legislators couldn't," Nelms said.

During the debate, the commission said it might have made a difference if Avery had been actively farming the land and a heart attack or serious illness prevented him from working. Since he had not really worked the land, Hunter said he couldn't go along with dismissing the taxes.

"It's not legal or moral," he said.

Hunter moved that Avery's appeal be denied, but three commissioners abstained from the vote. County Administrator Theron Gay said he would get an opinion from the Attorney General's office and relate it to the board at a meeting later this month.