In the past few weeks, the residents of Herricks have been receiving their tax bills.
Much to their dismay, many homes received an increase of 6.98 percent on their school taxes. This increase is the fault of Nassau County and its antiquated and archaic assessment system.
By law, the Herricks school board was required to follow the new state guidelines of the 2 percent tax cap. The problem for many homeowners is that the assessed value of their homes remained the same while their neighbors have challenged their assessments and received reductions.
The county sets the assessed value of our homes and to quote an official in another school district, “the tax bill increase for any homeowner has nothing to do with the school district but everything to do with Nassau County and its assessment practices.”
However, that is not the view or understanding of the homeowners. All they see is a dramatic increase in their school taxes and put the blame squarely at the hands of the school board and the administration.
We find this extremely unfair to our constituents and are now going to direct all their inquiries to the county and all its elected officials and unelected appointees.
The chart below shows the Herricks school district whose tax rates are established by the practices of the Nassau County Assessor.
Also included are some neighboring districts so that you can understand the magnitude of what has just taken place.
The column shaded in green is the responsibility of the school districts. The columns shaded in pink are the sole responsibility of the Nassau County Assessor. The column shaded in beige demonstrates the impact of the assessor’s decisions on the tax burden for homeowners.
The column shaded in blue is the only information, along with the assessed value of their property,that property taxpayers will really care about.
How we get from the green to the blue is completely, unequivocally the responsibility of the county. “Sticker Shock” is simply the difference between the tax levy increase requested by the school district (green) and the tax rate change calculated by the county (blue).
For example, Herricks proposed a budget increase for 2013-14 of 3.19 percent after the few exceptions to the tax cap were eliminated, and a tax levy increase of 3.02 percent.
The tax levy increase is actually less than the budget increase because Herricks was able to rely upon other sources of revenue (fund balance, state aid, etc.) aside from the tax levy.
Unfortunately for the homeowners of Herricks, the county assessor decided to grant assessment reduction claims to 87 percent of the claimants countywide.
The impact on the homeowner of the 3.87 percent reduction in assessed value means that the tax rate increase for homeowners in Herricks (7.12 percent) is more than twice the tax levy increase (3.02 percent).
For homeowners who did not file a claim that their assessed value should be lower, the increase in their tax bill will be more than twice as high as they might have expected based on the budget presented in May – and not a penny of the difference can be attributed to the school district.
Tax Levy Percent Change Assessed Value Percent Change Adjusted Base Proportion Percent Change Change in Class 1 Levy % due to ABP Tax Rate Percent Change Sticker Shock.
We would hope that the news reports and editorial pages of any newspaper could help our residents understand this rather simple concept: “Sticker shock,” the result of the increase in tax rates compared to tax levies, is the responsibility of the Nassau County Assessor.
If any homeowner has a school tax bill increase greater than the increase in the tax levy proposed by our district, we have urged them to call and speak with the county assessor immediately to find out how that happened!
James Gounaris, President,
Herricks Board of Education,
Herricks Schools Celebrating 200 Years of Education Excellence!
Nancy Feinstein,
Vice-President
Christine Turner
Brian Hassan
Juleigh Chin
