Assessor’s Employee Given Probation, Fine

A former employee in the Ventura County assessor’s office was sentenced to three years’ probation and fined $750 for trying to lower the assessed value of her property, officials said Tuesday.

Barbara Sorem-Hughlett, who worked as an appraiser, pleaded no contest Monday to a misdemeanor count of conflict of interest, said Deputy Dist. Atty. Tom Temple. Sorem-Hughlett tried in October 2000 to lower the value of her home in Santa Paula by $20,000 and take off an additional $5,000 as a nuisance for living behind a flood channel, Temple said. If her plan had worked, she would have saved $190 a year on property taxes.