Onteora does paymentin-lieu-of-taxes math

Onteora board does payment-in-lieu-of-taxes math

School officials have been able to put numbers behind their objections to payment-in-lieu-of-taxes agreements.

Onteora school district officials have been able to put numbers behind their objections to payment-in-lieu-of-taxes agreements for large projects, the impact on tax rates supporting their concerns.

The figures were discussed during a Board of Education meeting Tuesday, with Assistant Superintendent Monica LaClair providing a hypothetical example of what would happen with and without Ulster County Industrial Development Agency approval for tax breaks on a hypothetical project that would add $10 million to a property’s value.

New projects that do not get tax breaks have the increased assessment of a property added to the overall district property values. The example used by LaClair is based on a $40.25 million levy with district-wide assessments of $3.5 billion, with tax rates determined by dividing the levy by total assessments and stating the result as an amount owed based on every $1,000 of property value.

Under the figures provided during the presenta-

tion, the rate per $1,000 assessed value would be:

• $11.50 if there were no project.

• $11.47 if the project were completed without a payment-in-lieu-of-taxes agreement.

• $11.48 if there was a payment-in-lieu-of-taxes agreement.

The difference in rate comes from not increasing the property’s assessment under the county tax payment plan.

Most county Industrial Development Agency payment plans are for 10 to 20 years with gradual increases in assessments after the first three to five years.

Concern over the impact of tax breaks has come in response to an application by developers Tannery Brook Real Estate LLC to have $305,338 in property taxes waived over a 10-year period for the Woodstock Way hotel project.

Under the Woodstock Way application for tax breaks on a 2.42-acre parcel the developer, which pays $17,671 in current property taxes, would not pay additional taxes on improvements for three years, then it would pay on only 25 percent of the improved value for two years, followed by

a five-year period during which there would be payments on 50 percent of the improved value.