The Town of Lancaster is considering conducting a property reassessment (reval) program in the near future. The goal is to make sure the new assessments match what properties would sell for in the open market so owners are paying their fair share of the tax levy.

The only way to combat growing inequity is through a reassessment, which is recommended every three to four years. Lancaster has not had a reassessment since 2010.

According to assessors reassessments do not generate more tax dollars. Only an elected Town Board raising the tax levy can do that. Well, that’s mostly true except for property owners whose assessments increase and they will now pay more in taxes.

Sound fair? I can’t think of another or fairer way for towns to raise revenue than taxes based on full market value. However, the fairness leaves the room when we again consider the state’s egregious 339-y Condominium Law concept bastardized by developers and builders at the expense of the rest of the taxpayers. Today’s Buffalo News’s ‘Another Voice’ opinion post clearly states the unfairness of this law:

http://buffalonews.com/2018/05/15/another-voice-8/

The state law governing condominium developments was intended to address the need for affordable (vertical) housing primarily in downstate urban areas. Instead the device has been used by developers in suburban communities to provide well-to-do buyers with tax breaks in exchange for market (or generally above-market) rate housing at the expense of municipalities and the majority of taxpayers.

Despite municipalities submitting memorandum correspondences to Albany voicing objection to the tax breaks, little lip service is provided thereafter and municipalities grant the site plan rezones for the condominium subdivisions to flourish – throwing their collective hands in the air while lamenting that it is a state law and they are hand-tied. We hear about the influence of the Association of Towns, where the beef?

What is especially onerous about this law and its tax break percentage is that the tax reduction often exceeds the association fee that the property owner pays – sometimes two to three times over the cost of an association fee, depending on property market value.

Unfortunately, the private property owner unable to purchase a patio or townhome at $250,000 or higher will have to continue subsidizing the more affluent who are able to buy into a good thing as nothing will change – the developers will see to that.