Property owners seek redress from the county

A homeowner or business property owner receives their tax bill and thinks the amount of property taxes they are paying is too high and does not reflect the value of their properties.
What should a property owner do?
In Nassau County a property owner can file an appeal with the Assessment Review Commission, an independent agency, separate from the county’s Department of Assessment. This is an administrative review of the assessment. The deadline this year for submitting an appeal is March 2.
Property owners can also go through the courts and either file a Small Claims Assessment Review, which is considered a low-cost option, or a tax certiorari proceeding in State Supreme Court, where the property owner should hire a lawyer to represent them.
Assessments can be challenged based a several factors including unequal assessment, the property is assessed at a higher level than others in the area; the property is assessed higher than the actual market value; an exemption was improperly denied or the property is in the wrong tax classification.
According to Shalom Maidenbaum, whose Cedarhurst-based Maidenbaum Property Tax Reduction Group, has been helping property owners for more than 25 years, the current system is fairer than it’s ever been. “[The county] is spending the resources and treating homeowners fairly,” he said. “It took many years to get to this point, but slowly and surely it’s being addressed by this administration. The focus for now will be what comprises the budget and county spending more than who is assessed, and then make adjustments based on market conditions.”
Two pieces of legislation approved by the County Legislature last year helped to improve the assessment system, said County Legislator Howard Kopel (R-Lawrence), who wrote one of the measures which created an escrow fund to pay out claims. It also allows the county assessor to hold up 10 percent of a property owner’s claim until the dispute is settled by the county or decided in the courts.