Can I challenge a weed assessment (from city of Birmingham)

[Bryan Hartlen]

Hi all...  we acquired a property in Birmingham in Sep 2018.  We ran title and tax lien searches and they were clean.  We received an invoice from the City of Birmingham for $322 with a description of "Fee for Services".  Five or six calls later we have some convergence on the story.  It appears to be that this was for a weed assessment made in 2016 (2 years before our ownership). The clerks say assessments aren't liens (so they don't show on searches) but once invoiced we have 12 months to pay before they become liens.  The clerks didn't offer any options to contest the fee. 

My question to my more experienced Birmingham investors:  Has anyone successfully contested this kind of assessment?  If so, any direction or insights would be appreciated.