carwreck.com: around Boston harbor...

Today's mail contained a collections letter from a law office in Rhode Island for past due motor vehicle excise taxes. During the six months I was living in a government owned (I was in the Coast Guard at the time) apartment in Middletown, RI during 1998 I owned a '92 Toyota 4Runner which I then sold after buying a '95 Chevy Caprice. Somehow they are holding me accountable for 459 days of ownership for the Toyota and 243 days of ownership for the Chevy and are assessing the value at "over $8000" for both cars. This brings my total amount due to over $750. How absurd is that?! I spoke to both the law office handling the collection as well as the Middletown Assessors Office in an effort to understand these charges and they both were unhelpful in explaining why the amount is so high, except to say that it seemed normal to them. How can it be so much when I paid $38.75 for 2002 excise taxes here in MA?