Updated 05/25/2011 05:46 AM
Speaker Silver unveils Assembly's property tax cap plan
Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver has released his version of a property tax bill, echoing the Governor's plans for a two percent cap on tax levies. With Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos saying he's confident a tax cap will pass this year, it looks like lawmakers have reached a tentative three way agreement. Capital Tonight's Nick Reisman explains.
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ALBANY, N.Y. -- Calling it a game-changer, Governor Andrew Cuomo sided with Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver's alternative to a long-awaited tax cap proposal. The measure would still cap property taxes at two percent or the rate of inflation, but it would exclude increases in pension costs and allow for growth in the local tax base. And the cap would expire alongside rent control laws for New York City, in effect linking the two issues.
"This agreement is a big deal. This issue is probably the most powerful and pervasive issue across the state," Cuomo said.
Speaking with a group of business leaders behind him, Cuomo compared the cap to the recently approved 2011-12 state budget, which reduced spending for the first time in 15 years.
"I think when you put the budget together with a property tax cap in this state, it's going to be a game-changer and it's going to change the trajectory of this state. You're going to see and feel it and see it and feel it relatively quickly," Cuomo said.
The governor denied that letting the bill expire was a reversal of what his spokesman said several weeks ago, who called a sunset a "non-starter."
Cuomo said, "This is a law, like rent regulations, which will come up for reevaluation, recalibration, on a periodic basis that makes sense like the rent regulation laws."
Still, the agreement isn't completely inked. Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos wavered in his enthusiasm for the cap during a news conference, saying that some version of the cap would be in place.
"We are going to have to narrow down some of the parameters," Skelos said.
His office later clarified Skelos's position, saying only the sunset date and "minor technical details" are the only sticking points. As for Silver, whose conference has long-resisted limiting property tax increases because of its effect on schools, won a big victory by essentially tying the cap to rent control for New York City.
"We will join the two. These two are inextricably linked in terms of passage," Silver said.