Suffolk Supervisors Ask Albany to Revisit 2% Property Tax Cap

Supervisors of six of Suffolk County's 10 towns signed a letter Monday, Oct. 5, asking Gov. Kathy Hochul and state lawmakers to revisit New York's property tax cap, saying costs set or shaped by Albany are eating up the 2% levy growth the law allows. The governor's office defended the cap.

The supervisors signed the letter at a bipartisan news conference at Brookhaven Town Hall in Farmingville, and the Town of Brookhaven said it will be forwarded to Albany. It seeks a meeting on the cap formula, unfunded state mandates and more room for expenses towns cannot control. The supervisors pointed to required pension contributions, employee health insurance premiums, the rising cost of disposing of solid waste, LIPA payments in lieu of taxes and court-ordered expenses.

The cap, which first applied in 2012, limits yearly growth in a local government's tax levy to 2% or the rate of inflation, whichever is lower, with some exceptions. State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli's office set the 2027 inflation factor for towns and other calendar-year governments at 3.13% in July, which left the cap at 2% for a sixth straight year. The law lets municipalities override the limit.

"It is impossible to maintain the parks, beaches, roads and garbage collection, along with other lifesaving services, without exceeding the 2% tax cap," Huntington Supervisor Ed Smyth said. "We hope the State will abandon the arbitrary 2% tax cap and establish a formula that recognizes economic reality." Huntington's tentative 2027 budget, presented to the Town Board on Oct. 2, would exceed the cap.

Hochul's office pushed back. "The property tax cap is a critical protection for homeowners, especially now when Washington's tariffs and inflationary policies are driving up costs for families across New York," Gordon Tepper, a spokesman for the governor, said in a statement. "Elected officials across the state should be looking for ways to control costs, not asking homeowners to pay more."

Every middle school child who took home economics knows that to balance a budget you can either increase revenue or lower costs. Oddly none of the legislators involved in this proposal suggested lowering costs to accomplish this objective. They also all seem to support the banning of data centers which have the potential of immediately solving this problem and, quite likely, allowing for the lowering of property taxes due to the windfall of revenue they would represent. Seemingly raising property taxes is the only idea worthy of consideration.

Under state law, Suffolk's town boards must adopt their 2027 budgets by Nov. 20.