Follow Up on the News

Interview with DEP Commissioner Christopher Ward

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City Review

At the same time, in an apparent bow to pressure from the Coalition of Watershed Towns and other municipalities in the Catskills, the DEP has withdrawn its plan to spend $600,000 to hire consultants to review project impacts which were to have included secondary growth and community character. Instead, the agency will proceed with a smaller consulting contract focusing primarily on its principal concerns with water quality.
In a statement issued June 24, DEP announced it will be providing up to $100,000 for local review of the Belleayre Resort project, with funds to be shared by Shandaken and Middletown. A memorandum of agreement between the towns and the City specifying the share each will receive and specific terms is currently under discussion, with the town's supervisors in apparent accord to share information.
"I've been working on this since early April, when I first contacted DEP to ask whetherthey'd consider making some money available in light of the developer's refusal to provide it" said Supervisor Pete Di Modica." After many discussions I met with the Commissioner in May and talked about our funding problem, which I followed with a letter requesting their assistance. I just didn't think it was fair for Shandaken's taxpayers to have to pay for the review of a project to benefit the developer's investors"
Di Modica's lobbying seems to have dovetailed with Senator Bonicic's effort to limit the scope of DEP's review of the project, reflecting concerns of the Coalition of Watershed Towns, the developer, and Shandaken's Town Board with the City's involvement in non-water quality issues.
"I felt the City could be a good neighbor by doing this," Bonacic said this week. "It's important that these two municipalities have the funds to meet their responsibility to properly review this project."
Following the City's announcement, Crossroad's Dean Gitter said in the Daily Freeman that any use of DEP funds must be determined by Shandaken's Planning Board.
As for how much the city will now spend on its review, Catskill Center director Tom Alworth said as far as he knew, they were going to spend up to $500,000.
Bonacic added that it was his understanding that DEP would keep its review in-house, not utilizing "outside contractors beholden to upholding a preconcieved view."
"I'm pleased that we'll be able to provide money to the Planning Board" said Di Modica. "Under SEQRA they'll need to look at planning issues which are broader than site plan review. We don't know how much they'll need yet, or even how much is available. But it is not in the jurisdiction of the Planning Board to review fiscal impacts, the impacts on Shandaken's taxpayers. That's the Town Board's responsibility, and we intend to hire the best people we can find to help us understand that."
"The simple fact", says Di Modica, "is the developer doesn't want its host town to review the project at all. The fact that he now wants to tell Shandaken how to look out for its taxpayers and figure out if the town can afford his project, that's par for the course for Dean."

Taxes

"It's an alternative tax apportionment program that's totally voluntary," said Joe Hesch, spokesperson for the state Office of Real Property Services, which oversees the tax code. He noted that the suggested change was first brought to his department six years ago by members of the state Asasociation of Towns, as well as the legislative committee of the state Assessors Association.
The new tax code provision, Section 1316 of the state's Real Property Tax Law, allows school districts, and county governments, to adopt annual resolutions "no later than 10 days prior to the last day to levy taxes" that would allow a district to then eliminate disparities among all properties if, and only if, the large property in question 1) constitutes five percent or more of the total assessed value of a city or town; 2) the full value of the property is at least five million dollars, and 3) the percentage of difference between the State equalization rate and the local apportionment equalization rate for that property is at least five percent.
The tax code replaces the traditional apportionment method for school districts (RPTL 1314) only if approved by the taxing entity. And according to Hesch, the current tax code changes effects only 28 school districts throughout the state, the only other Ulster County communities in question being Warwarsing, with the Rondout reservoir and state prison, and Shawungunk, with its state prison.
According to Chuck Snyder, business manager for the Onteora School District, the last day he can levy taxes is August 31, meaning any passage of the current tax code provision would have to occur before August 21, at the latest. The school board's next meeting is set for July 14. With no communication from the state Office of Real Property Services to the school district prior to a May 5 memo, and no communication of the issue to board members yet, Snyder said the matter had not been put on the agenda for that date, as far as he knew.
"We don't even have our final assessments or equalization rates for the coming year yet," he said this week. "I don't think any of us knew this was coming. At the moment, we're all trying to figure out what it all means."
That, Snyder said, included claims by Olive town supervisor Berndt Leifeld that any attempt by the school district to implement such a new apportionment, no matter how fair to the rest of the district, would force him to start looking at a municipal revaluation of assessments, which Olive has not undertaken in the last twenty-six years he's been involved in town government.
"The city's assessment level has been at about $100 million for the last 15 years," Leifeld said on Tuesday. "We've been fighting for a $300 million assessment. Now, say we get our 100 percent new assessments, where will that leave the school district? They could stand to lose a million, one and a half million in state aid if they push this. It's up to the school board"
Leifeld, who said he was going to a special Catskills Watershed Corporation meeting to discuss the new law's implications with Albany attorneys on Thursday, noted that although he understood the ideal of equalizing tax amounts between townships behind the legislation, he felt compelled to protect his local constituents.
"I'm going to have to rant and rave about this. That's my job," he said. "I just wish I'd known more about it earlier."
Discussing the law's potential effect on Olive taxpayers, Leifeld said, "Here's the problem... When the City came in here and took away thousands of acres of our town's best land, including its villages, to build the reservoir, they effectively gave us no way of ever getting a commercial tax base here. That effected our people then, it effects our people now. So where the hell do they come in with this talk about fluctuation of law and tax rates when the biggest fluctuations are going to effect the people right here."
Leifeld was referring to the central problem that the new tax code provision was designed to address. For years now, Olive has had a lower tax rate than its surrounding towns, largely because of the reservoir. There have been complaints about how little the City pays, and back-and-forth lawsuits over the matter, but no one's really pushed the situation because, as the town supervisor says, "We could win the battles, but we'd lose the war," triggering losses in school aid and other benefits.
According to state records, Olive has a equalized value of $62,684,000, of which $1,801,914 goes to OCS from 3,079 properties. The lion's share is from the city. In comparison, Woodstock has an equalization value of $59,514,000, paying $3,129,617 to OCS from 4,769 properties; Shandaken has a $21,358,000 equalization value, paying in $1,883,921 on 3,054 properties; and Hurley has an equalization value of $35,964,00, paying in $540,600 to OCS from a total of 3,435 properties in town, many of those in other school districts.
"In my view, this is a larger issue than just Olive and Onteora," said Leifeld. He added that Alan Rosa, executive director of the CWC, which oversees all watershed matters between New York City and the West-of-Hudson Upstate region in which a majority of its reservoirs lie, had pledged to help all he could, even though many of the school districts in rural Greene, Sullivan, Schoharie and Delaware counties are still single-municipality districts with schools that run from k-12 in one building.
"I heard about it all from one of my residents, who heard about it from Bob Cross, who's talking about running against Pete DiModica over in Shandaken. Cross heard it from (Woodstock Supervisor) Jeremy Wilbur, who gave him some papers that came into his office from somewhere," Leifeld said of the roundabout fashion in which he found out about the possibly huge tax hikes to his town. "Now that I look back on it over the last eight years, I remember my assessor saying something about some bill up in Albany maybe effecting the reservoir. That must have been a year ago. I just wish there'd been more communications."
Wilbur said Cross "just happened to be in my office" when a fax about the new tax code came into his office. And he added that, "The assessors, they were aware that this thing was under consideration for quite some time."
So how did he feel about it, or Leifeld's problems with how it could effect Olive?
"I'll tell you where I stand," Wilbur said. "First of all, I think it is disgraceful that New York State has to fund our children's education with so much of an emphasis on property taxes. But we're stuck with that for now... even though I think the time will come where the state comes up with a better way. Being things as they are, the burden of taxation for our education must be spread out as fairly as possible. I believe this is a step in the rigtht direction."
And Leifeld?
"Oh, I had a very brief conversation with him last week," Wilbur said on Wednesday. "I may actually be seeing him at the Ulster County Supervisor's Association meeting tonight."
According to Leifeld, changes to Olive tax payers could be as much as $143 per $1000 of assessed value, were the new tax code provision okayed. According to Wilbur and Shandaken town supervisor Pete DiModica, their residents' property taxes could go down between $2 and $4 per $1000, representing savings of an average few hundred dollars per property.
"It's a question of weighing advantages," said State Assemblyman Kevin Cahill of the new code. "The key to it all is avoiding parochial battles between municipalities. I understand the argument from Olive's point of view, but there's also the question of equalizing matters for the entire school district."
Noting that he wished he had been more aware, earlier, of the possible effects the new legislation would have had on Olive and other towns in his district, Cahill said the trick, now, was to ensure that everyone came together to sit down and discuss the effects new apportionment would have across the board.
"It comes down to questions about real benefits to a community. Is a matter of a few dollars savings to one town worth such trouble to another," he said. "The big problem is that the amounts are so large because we've put the burden of education on our property owners in the first place. I just hope this produces more discussion of that state of affairs."
Speaking on behalf of the Ulster County Real Property Service, Assistant Director Sue Tillson said her agency's director, Dorothy Martin, was set to address a special meeting of the legislature in July. She added that any action on the county's part, which would have a much quieter effect than any changes in school district tax levies, would have to occur before November 1.
"We're looking into it here," she said, noting that tax assessments at large corporations like the Hudson Valley Mall, owned by the Pyramid Corp., would not be effected because there was currently no discrepancies between State and local assessment figures. "The underlying problem here may have something to do with tax assessment revals, which Olive, Warwarsing and Shandaken haven't done in years."
"I'm politically savvy enough to not even go there," said DiModica, who's preparing to face serious opposition this fall after one term in office.
"You start with that shit, it won't stop," said Leifeld. "You'll be seeing a feeding frenzy, then. I'm my board members, asking if they want to go down this slope."
Noted OCS Board Member Meg Carey, an Olive resident, in conclusion: "None of this has been discussed by the board yet. We haven't even heard from the school attorney on this. We still don't have any of the right information to even start considering making a decision."
After a pause, Carey added: "August is the deadline? That would be amazing for us to move that quickly."