Town of Ossining Moving Ahead with Property Revaluation
While the City of Peekskill wrestles with spending $1 million on a revaluation of residential and commercial properties, the Town of Ossining is moving ahead with being the third municipality in Westchester to take the leap.
Tyler Technologies, the company that is also handling the revaluation of properties in the City of Yonkers and Town of Greenburgh, will be attending the Ossining Town Board’s April 15 meeting to present a detailed overview of the project, including how homes and businesses will be inspected.
Town Supervisor Susanne Donnelly stated in a message to residents that town officials have been discussing revaluation for the past two years and have hosted representatives from the New York State Office of Real Property Tax Services who encourage all communities to undergo revaluation to ensure fair and equitable assessments of properties.
“While there may be a shift in how some properties are valued, many people will find that their property taxes will not change drastically,” Donnelly maintained. “We have worked with both villages and school systems on this project, and have actively kept them in the ‘loop’ throughout the whole process. Everyone understands the importance of this process, as it is the only way to both slow and minimize the grieving of taxes, which result in large refunds, lost administrative time, and costs to borrow money to pay settlements.”
Since 2009, Ossining has paid more than $1.27 million in tax certioraris and other associated costs, which the town has had to bond for.
Peekskill City Assessor Michele Jordan has been pushing the city to join the consortium of municipalities in getting a cheaper group rate from Tyler Technologies to correct what she believes have been decades of “inequities” of either over assessed or under assessed parcels.
So far, the Common Council has not committed to pursuing revaluation, due in large part to the hefty cost that Peekskill has no reserves to cover.
Rick has more than 40 years’ experience covering local news in Westchester and Putnam counties, running the gamut from politics and crime to sports and human interest. He has been an editor at Examiner Media since 2012. Read more from Rick’s editor-author bio here. Read Rick’s work here: https://www.theexaminernews.com/author/pezzullo_rick-writer/
