RyeCity REVIEW THE
February 22, 2019 | Vol. 7, Number 8 | www.ryecityreview.com
Latimer pushes Property Taxpayers Protection Act
Rye’s Declan Lavelle celebrates a goal against Byram Hills on Feb. 19. Lavelle had a hat-trick in the Garnets’ 6-2 victory. For story. See page 16. Photo/Mike Smith
County introduces Building Energy Benchmarking Policy Furthering his commitment to energy conservation and sustainability throughout Westchester, County Executive George Latimer has proposed the Westchester County Energy Benchmarking Policy. The policy would enable the county to apply for clean energy project grants from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, NYSERDA, in order to build more cost-effective, environmentally friendly municipal buildings. This is the first time Westchester would be collecting, report-
ing and sharing building energy data among municipal officials and the public, in order to make smarter, greener decisions about our buildings and energy use. “Buildings are the single largest user of energy in Westchester County,” Latimer said. “Typically, our poorest performing buildings are using several times the amount of energy as our highest performing buildings—for the exact same building use. Adopting the Energy Benchmarking Policy will allow us to research and compare our municipal buildings’ performance to
similar buildings nationwide, and use that information to make continuous improvements towards energy efficiency.” In order to become eligible for certain clean energy funds from NYSERDA, Westchester needed to meet specific requirements under its Clean Energy Communities Program. The enactment of the Westchester County Energy Benchmarking Policy is another one of those requirements. “This administration is taking an aggressive path to minimize our greenhouse gas emissions and the first step on that path is to as-
sess where we are with our energy usage, good and bad,” said Peter McCartt, county director of energy conservation and sustainability. “Even though we are one of the greenest counties in the state and have many initiatives in process including our newly formed Climate Crisis Task Force, we can’t set a comprehensive plan to be even better without knowing exactly where to direct our finite resources.” If approved by the county Board of Legislators, the act would go into effect immediately. (Submitted)
Focused on taking the burden off Westchester County property taxpayers and combating the loss of the federal SALT deduction, County Executive George Latimer is calling for the passage of the Westchester County Property Taxpayers Protection Act. The act would allow for freezing property taxes for the next two years, Fiscal Year 2020 and Fiscal Year 2021; allocate 30 percent of new revenues to local governments and school districts to assist their budgets and tax relief efforts; ensure an annual increase in the county’s reserve fund, as well as end reliance on one-shot revenues and borrowing for operating costs; and create sales tax parity across all of Westchester’s communities, bringing the rate in line with other counties including Rockland and Putnam, and other cities including White Plains, Mount Vernon and New Rochelle. The new countywide standard rate of 8 3/8 percent would still be lower than that in effect in Yonkers, New York City, Nassau and Suffolk counties. The additional 1 percent in sales tax is estimated to bring in about $140 million a year in new revenue, 20 percent of which will be shared with the local municipalities and 10 percent with the school districts. In exchange for this act, Latimer has committed to maintain the county property tax levy for FY 2020 and 2021 at the same level as this year, FY 2019. This tax freeze will help address
the expected increases for many residents and taxpayers from the new Federal Tax Plan, which eliminates all but $10,000 in state and local tax exemptions, SALT. “This is about generating revenue without raising property taxes, by reaching sales tax rate parity,” Latimer said. “Westchester cannot meet its annual financial obligations in the years to come without steady new revenue; this position has been affirmed by the State Comptroller’s Audit of the county, and the three bond rating agencies that assess creditworthiness for governments. We will fall into State Fiscal Control, with our bond rating dropping further. Anyone who tells you otherwise is simply not telling you the truth. Further, Westchester cannot raise property taxes at any significant level over the next few years—we have reached a saturation point, given school and local taxes as well. As Governor Cuomo has said, and fought against at the federal level, the loss of the full SALT exemption will be hitting our property taxpayers hard. In my first year, we kept our property tax levy increase below neighboring counties such as Rockland and Putnam, but even this level is unsustainable. We need non-property tax revenue to deliver our services – most of which is mandated by the State of New York. The plan TAX continued on page 11
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