Allegheny County Chief Executive Dan Onorato's cap on assessment increases is a crucial program of "temporary tax relief" and does not violate state law or the Pennsylvania Constitution, argues a brief filed yesterday by the county Law Department with Common Pleas Court.

Also, hearing officers for the Allegheny County Property Assessment Appeals and Review Board have started receiving their paychecks and will resume hearings Tuesday, said Isobel Storch, the board's solicitor. The board put a hold on hearings last month after learning that the county had not yet processed the officers' contracts.

The 2006 reassessments for the county's 550,000 properties were put on hold in February, when Onorato said a cap on increasing property values was necessary to prevent significant tax hikes.

The Sto-Rox School District and a Franklin Park homeowner sued the county last month, saying Onorato and County Council overstepped their power when they created a six-category assessment system that limits increases to 4 percent.

In the brief filed yesterday, county attorneys said state law gives home rule governments, which include Allegheny County, the authority to adjust their assessment systems to address local problems.

The cap is necessary, the brief says, "until more fundamental changes are made at the state level to ensure a fairer and more equitable system of local taxation."

The brief also says the state constitution allows for the creation of separate classes of taxpayers.

The county will not mail out 2006 property assessments until Common Pleas Judge R. Stanton Wettick Jr. rules on the lawsuit. A hearing is scheduled for Tuesday.

Today is the deadline to file appeals of 2005 assessment values. Wettick extended the deadline last month.

At yesterday's appeals board meeting, board members learned that payments for hearing officers were all up to date.

"We're back at work," Storch said.

Hearing officers receive a flat rate of $225 a day for residential real estate cases and $300 a day for commercial and industrial real estate cases. The county has contracts with about 30 officers.

Several hundred appeal hearings involving homes or businesses that suffered extensive damage during the Sept. 17 floods likely will be rescheduled next month, Storch said.

The board discarded the results of the first round of hearings for those properties last month because the Office of Property Assessments had used the appeals board's letterhead to instruct hearing officers how to apply assessment reductions to damaged homes.

Board members argued that they should be instructing the officers, not the assessment office.

At Tuesday's County Council meeting, county Manager Jim Flynn said the assessment office's use of the board's letterhead had been a mistake.