Hochul Promotes Affordability While Overlooking Property Tax Issues

As January unfolds, homeowners in New York City are bracing themselves to see how much their property tax bills will increase this year.

On Tuesday, Governor Hochul once again dashed hopes that Albany would make progress on reforming our unfair tax system.

Another State of the State address has passed, and once more, property tax reform was absent from the agenda.

Since its inception in 2018, the Property Tax Reform Commission, which we helped establish, has advocated for actionable changes to make our tax system fairer, more straightforward, and transparent — but to no avail.

It’s remarkable how blatant inequity can unite people like us, the Democrat Finance Chair and the Republican Minority Leader of the City Council.

Sadly, that blatant unfairness typifies our property tax system.

A state-mandated cap on the annual growth of assessed values, left unchanged for nearly four decades, has resulted in varying effective tax rates for small homeowners across different neighborhoods.

This is how a working-class family living in a $700K home in Bay Ridge or Staten Island’s South Shore ends up paying three times the property taxes of a wealthy family residing in a $5 million brownstone in upscale Manhattan.

Oddities in tax classifications mean that working-class co-op owners often bear a heavier tax burden than those owning 1- and 2-family homes, while luxury condo residents enjoy some of the best deals around.

Beyond these glaring issues, the complexity and opacity of our property tax laws feel almost intentional.

Despite the upcoming Notice of Property Value that homeowners will soon receive, and the efforts from the city’s Department of Finance to assist residents in understanding their tax calculations and applying for benefits, the truth is that most New Yorkers remain confused about our property tax system.
This isn’t due to a lack of intelligence; it’s a product of the system’s design.

The good news is, we have the power to change this.

By phasing out and replacing assessed value caps, we can ensure that homeowners pay taxes based on the real value of their homes, leveling the playing field.

We can also introduce a new classification for lower- and mid-value co-ops and condos to ease their undue burden, ensuring that the wealthiest property owners contribute their fair share.

Furthermore, we can demand clear and simplified tax calculations for all homeowners.

These necessary reforms must be enacted by the state Legislature in Albany. However, given that we’re experiencing the effects here in the five boroughs, we can’t afford to wait for them to take action.

That’s why, based on the initiatives of the Property Tax Reform Commission, the city specifically pushed for these changes along with several others in a comprehensive list of 10 recommendations back in 2021.

Those recommendations have been ready for implementation for three years but have gathered dust instead.

In fact, we became so frustrated with the lack of progress that in 2022, we collaborated to pass the first property tax rebate in almost two decades!

We’re done waiting. It took years for the city to align on this issue, often requiring cooperation from elected officials and communities benefiting from the current inequities.

Overburdened neighborhoods like ours needed acknowledgment from those in better situations that fairness must prevail, even at a cost to their advantages.

After significant effort, we reached that consensus at the city level, but waiting for resolution with the state is no longer an option for our communities.

We’ve invested substantial time in this endeavor; we know that property tax reform can seem like a distant dream. However, it can become reality.

Every candidate running for mayor should be rightfully addressing affordability and proposing how they will deliver meaningful property tax reforms to New Yorkers.

No politician in 2025 can genuinely champion an “affordability agenda” without supporting a plan that could effectively realize that goal.

If New York is to stand for fairness and equal treatment under the law, 2025 must be the year we finally get this done. After all, the blueprint for reform has existed for years.

Joe Borelli is the minority leader of the New York City Council. Justin Brannan, a Democrat, represents Southern Brooklyn in the City Council.