Dear Rondout Valley Central School District Board Member,

Thank you for all that you do. As you probably know, New York State recently raised the Low Income Senior Citizen Property Tax Exemption income limit to $58,400. New York State also recently set a new percentage – 65% off, to which a school, town or county may raise the sliding scale. Many local school districts, towns and counties have raised their caps as well. Our closest neighbors – New Paltz, Kingston, Onteora and Ellenville schools and the town of Marbletown – are all currently at or above $50,000. Ulster County has raised its cap 3 times in the last year, reaching the New York State maximum allowed. The City of Kingston and New Paltz give 50% off for incomes less than $41,600. Ulster County gives 50% off for any income less than $49,999.99. Sadly, Rondout Valley has raised its cap only once in almost 25 years. Even with the recent adjustment, Rondout Valley, a more affluent district than many, is way behind in helping the low-income seniors within the district afford to live here.

Many schools and towns set their caps at the state maximum, only needing to adjust their cap whenever the State does. Rondout Valley needs to do more to ensure that senior citizens are able to age in place. School taxes are hitting them hard and many are being forced to move. This is even more the case for seniors who live in a town with a recent raise in assessment. Helping these seniors has a negligible effect on the remaining tax payers while allowing many senior citizens to remain in their homes.

Almost all local senior citizens have been paying full taxes within the Rondout Valley School district for decades. Now, some low-income seniors need the assistance that their full tax burden helped enable others before. A yearly Social Security Cost Of Living Adjustment (COLA) has been lowering the assistance for many senior citizens. As Rondout's cap remains stagnant, and senior citizens' Social Security checks go up, senior citizens wind up in lower brackets for assistance. Overall, the Social Security raise puts them in a worse position financially. What would the burden on other taxpayers be?

What would everyone else actually pay?

Here's the important calculation.

Using Rondout's $48.505 million levy and approximately $5.063 billion of equalized taxable property: Every $1 million of additional senior exemption would shift approximately $9,600 per year onto the rest of the tax base.

That translates to approximately: $0.96 per year for each $100,000 of equalized property value.

A homeowner with $300,000 of equalized taxable value would pay roughly: $5.64 x 3 = about $17 more per year. A homeowner with $500,000 would pay about $28 more per year.

Rondout is helping its senior citizens less than all surrounding school districts. Please help us!

Just raise the sliding scale and the cap to match or surpass our neighboring communities, all of which are receiving gratitude for having done so. More than 200 residents/voters in the Rondout Valley Central School district chose to add their signatures to the email which went to the Rondout Valley School Board, to show their support for the sliding scale to be adjusted and the cap to be raised to at least match our neighbors, but ideally, to the maximum the State allows.

Thank you in advance for helping our local seniors. Sincerely,

Anita Gehrke

46-year Rondout Valley

School District resident