Consolidation Could Save Tax Dollars

The Town of LaGrange Town Board is committed to finding workable solutions to lower the cost of services provided to our taxpayers. Supervisor Wagner has been meeting regularly with area Supervisors and Mayors to identify such solutions through the possibility of sharing services or consolidating services.

Numerous planning meetings between Supervisor Wagner, Supervisor Pagones of Fishkill and Supervisor Colsey of Wappinger have been held to discuss the formation of a Consolidated Assessing Unit (CAU). The concept of a CAU has been developed by New York State through the enactment of a state law allowing such formation. New York State government has been highly supportive of such a unit and its inherent ability to cut costs and streamline a government service.

Recently, the Town of Beekman became interested in joining the CAU. The Town Boards of LaGrange, Fishkill, Wappinger and Beekman conducted joint meetings twice so far to discuss details for the formation of such a unit. As a result of the last held joint meeting all four towns voted to move forward with a grant application through the NYS Department of State to implement the program.

The grant will ask for funding to cover the expense of establishing the physical office site for the CAU, Hybrid Vehicles for use by the CAU, office equipment, transitional salaries for implementation and funding to educate the taxpayers relative to the program and its effect on them. While the application is still being refined leading up to a February 24 2009 deadline, the alliance of towns is seeking around $450,000.00 to implement the CAU plan.

Supervisor Wagner and Supervisor Pagones met in Albany with representatives of the Department of State and the Office of Real Property Tax Services to discuss the plan. Both agencies are very supportive and encouraging. Our hope is that the grant will be approved, but the process is highly competitive and nothing is certain quite yet.

A CAU is designed to operate as a separate and individual unit. The member municipalities through inter-municipal agreements will develop the unit according to the state statute. There will be an unpaid board of directors named by the member municipalities. That board of directors will have oversight responsibilities for the unit, hire the Assessor, oversee any employment issues with the unit, and set the budget. The member municipal boards (Town Boards) retain final say over the budgets and act as an insulation to ensure costs to not rise above the intended savings.

A Board of Assessment review will be named by the CAU Board of Directors and will hear grievances across the member communities.

The CAU will retain some employees of the Towns as Assessor Aides, Data Collectors etc…The unit will be housed in the Fishkill town hall.  Member towns are planning to retain a part-time Assessor Aide on site in each town hall to assist taxpayers with assessment related issues such as exemptions and similar paperwork filings. Assessment files will be recorded in an electronic format and will be accessible to employees of the CAU remotely to aid in providing constituents the service they may need without actually going to Fishkill.

The Assessor will schedule days during which he or she will be present in the individual town halls to meet with taxpayers. Meetings with the Assessor outside of those scheduled days can also be scheduled. The goal is to maintain services as much as possible, but residents should schedule their interactions with the Assessor to ensure they get the service they desire.

The overall budget of the CAU will be smaller than the combined budgets that result from each town maintaining a separate assessor’s office.

The Town of LaGrange is anticipating a yearly savings about $49,000.00 through the implementation of the CAU. CAU’s by their nature are designed to expand. Additional communities may opt to join and the savings will increase as additional members pay into the program.

Numerous additional meetings must take place to hammer out the details of the inter-municipal agreements and the formation of the CAU.