Coalition forms in support of
school tax cap
BY
JAMES T. MADORE | james.madore@newsday.com
July 1, 2008
ALBANY - Laura Pandelakis, a retired educator from
Manhasset, woke up at 5 a.m. yesterday to travel here to lobby on behalf
of capping yearly increases in school property taxes.
Pandelakis was one of three from Long Islanders for Educational Reform to
attend the launch of an umbrella organization supporting Gov. David A. Paterson's plan to limit school levies
to 4 percent per year. The group, New York Property Tax Cap Coalition, already has more than
250 members with at least 21 from Nassau and Suffolk counties, according to its Web site,
www.taxcapnow.org.
Pandelakis, who taught in the New York City schools for nearly 29 years and then spent
five years as an administrator on the Island,
said her experience had shown that simply spending more money doesn't improve
students' performance. "I know there really is no correlation between the
amount of money spent and academic excellence," she said.
Pandelakis and representatives of businesses and chambers of commerce came to
the capital at the behest of the Business Council of New York State, a driving
force behind the new tax-cap coalition. Council president Kenneth Adams said
the objective was to build support for Paterson's cap and serve as a counterweight to
powerful opponents, such as the 600,000-member teachers' union, New York State
United Teachers, and the Working Families Party.
Paterson's tax cap, by his own admission, faces an
uphill fight. The Senate's Republican majority is pushing for a trial period of
only two years while the Assembly's Democratic majority has ruled out a tax
limit unless adequate funding can be guaranteed for classrooms. And the 212
lawmakers left Albany last week and may not return until after
the fall elections.
"This proposal is responsible," Paterson said. "It is desperately needed ...
[and] I believe we need to come together and make it happen."
Coalition members dismissed the Senate GOP bill providing for a tax cap only until 2010.
Senate spokesman Scott Reif replied, "The Senate continues to be the only
house to approve a property tax cap in any form, the only house to introduce
the governor's program bill, and the only house that has shown a willingness to
address this important issue."
Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos (R-Rockville Centre) is expected
to discuss soaring property taxes later this week in Buffalo and Rochester, the first stops on his upstate tour.
Dan Weiller, aide to Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Manhattan), said Silver "does not support a property
tax cap unless, and only if, there were assurances of enough resources for
schoolchildren ... to ensure they can all receive a quality education."
Tax-cap opponents, including the Working Families Party, touted a new Web site
of their own yesterday, www.taxcutnow.org. They said lawmakers should adopt a
so-called circuit breaker that would link tax bills to a homeowner's ability to
pay. Funds now reserved for STAR rebate checks would make up the lost revenue.
Anita MacDougall, a computer consultant and tax reformer from Oyster Bay, disagreed, saying the circuit breaker did
nothing to rein in school spending. She also decried the low turnout in recent
school budget voting: about 249,000 votes with 145,607 supporting total
spending of $10.1 billion in Nassau and Suffolk.
"The property tax cap is an opportunity to establish some fiscal
discipline to these runaway costs ...," MacDougall said. "We need to
start moving in the right direction."
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