New York Republicans Reverse Course on Tax Cap

Bruno Breaks With Silver Over Levies

By JACOB GERSHMAN, Staff Reporter of the Sun June 19, 2008

In a dramatic policy shift, Senate Republicans in Albany say they are pulling back on their opposition to Governor Paterson's proposal to force school districts to limit the annual growth in property tax levies.

Under pressure from his conference members, the Republican majority leader of the Senate, Joseph Bruno, is poised to break with the Assembly Democrats and join the governor in supporting a tax cap.

Mr. Bruno is "definitely warming up to a tax cap," a Republican senator of Brooklyn, Martin Golden, said. "There is overwhelming support within the conference for some kind of property tax cap."

Republicans said the Senate may pass at the last minute a plan similar to what the governor has advanced before the Legislature adjourns for the year on Monday.

While Assembly Democrats and their leader, Speaker Sheldon Silver, are unlikely to immediately follow suit, an alliance between the Senate and the governor leaves them isolated on a hot-button issue that is gaining public support.

Such a move by Mr. Bruno would represent a significant victory for Mr. Paterson, a Democrat who has embarked on what many consider to be a long-shot effort to persuade the Legislature to approve a tax cap.

The administration's embrace of the issue is seen as a risky gambit for an untested governor whose electoral chances in 2010 depend heavily on his ability to establish himself as an effective leader and secure legislative victories within a short timeframe.

The governor is squaring off against the state's largest teachers union, New York State United Teachers, which is one of the most powerful interest groups in Albany and has vowed to put a stop to his legislation.

"We'd love to work with both houses of the Legislature to ensure that we get New Yorkers the property tax relief that they desperately need," a spokeswoman for the governor, Risa Heller, said in a statement.

The majority leader's apparent change of heart comes in the wake of a poll that found that nearly three-quarters of New Yorkers support the governor's plan, which would cap the yearly growth in school property tax levies outside New York City at 4% or 120% the rate of inflation, whichever is less. (Historically, the latter figure has been the lower one, averaging around 3.4% over the last decade.)

School property taxes have risen by an average of 6% a year since 1998, despite a recent surge in state education spending. Supporters of the governor's plan, which is modeled on a tax cap measure in Massachusetts, say it's a critical first step toward restraining growth in levies, while the teachers union and other critics warn that it would punch a hole in school budgets.

At a press conference last Thursday, Mr. Bruno dismissed the governor's plan, criticizing it as phony relief for homeowners, and said he wouldn't introduce it on the floor. Instead, the majority leader offered up a plan to eliminate school property taxes for homeowners by shifting the burden to the state at a cost of $12 billion over five years.

With virtually no chance of passage in the Assembly, Mr. Bruno's plan was seen as an attempt to assuage taxpayers without alienating the teachers union.

At a closed-door conference meeting yesterday, Senate Republicans questioned the wisdom of the strategy in light of a poll released this week that showed that 74% of New Yorkers support a tax cap. Members argued that the political benefit of siding with the governor outweighs the consequences of ignoring the teachers union, "Seventy-four percent of the people of the state say we ought to partner with him," a Republican senator of Orange and Ulster Counties, William Larkin, said.

Another Republican senator, George Winner, said of the governor's proposal: "A number of people expressed support for it and feel it was a good proposal."

Said Mr. Winner: "We are exasperated at the unwillingness of the Assembly to do anything about property tax relief. Partnering with the governor is hopefully what will work to bring the Assembly along."

Mr. Winner said Republicans have already gone a long way toward earning the loyalty of the teachers union, noting that the Senate approved record increases in school aid in the last two years and sided with the group earlier in the year when it voted to prohibit school districts from using student performance data in making tenure determinations.

"We've done a lot for NYSUT and a lot for school aid," Mr. Winner said. "We supported them on the tenure issue. We supported them down the line. We still support NYSUT."

Mr. Silver has said he won't support a tax cap unless he's assured the schools would receive adequate funding. "The speaker's position hasn't change," a spokesman for Mr. Silver, Dan Weiller, said. "The speaker supports a property tax cap as long as we maintain our commitment to providing resources to educate New York's schoolchildren."