Published: July 07, 2009 11:20 pm      

CITY OF TONAWANDA: Council eyes change to home improvement tax break

A tax exemption being mulled over by the City of Tonawanda Common Council could make things complicated for the assessor’s office.

The law, published for the first time at Tuesday’s meeting, would make an increase of up to $80,000 in a home’s assessment due to an improvement exempt from taxation for the next year. The exemption would continue for five years, decreasing by 20 percent each year so that the home’s full value would begin being taxed six years after the improvements are made.

But City Assessor Pat Bacon raised several concerns to the council about turning that idea into a reality. How to determine when the improvement is completed was high on that list. Bacon said she sends out notifications of assessment changes in April, but would likely have to move that up substantially to keep with the law’s March 1 deadline.

“Now I’d have to have those notifications going out to people probably January 1, because they have to file their exemption before March 1,” Bacon said.

Council President Carleton Zeisz was optimistic that the total number of assessments affected would likely be small, and Bacon agreed that the change wouldn’t impact all homeowners.

Still, adding another March 1 deadlined exemption to the existing senior, disability and STAR exemptions would increase the workload. The improvement exemption would also necessitate more coordination between the building department and assessor’s office, something Bacon said would need to be made clear to Building Inspector Kevin Rank. The council said they may have Rank attend the next work session along with Bacon to hash out details.

But that’s not the only coordination that will be required in Bacon’s estimation.

“(Erie County) and the school district also have to opt into it, and I wouldn’t expect the school district to opt into that, or the county with the state it’s in,” she said. “It worked in Wheatfield because the county was on board.”

The council published the name of the law Tuesday, but said they’ll be looking at the law in more detail and streamlining the plan before anything is approved.

Contact reporter Daniel Pyeat 693-1000, ext. 158.