10/16/2023 Assessment Community Weekly

Volunteer firefighters and ambulance workers exemption

At the NYS Assessors Association conference earlier this month, a question arose regarding the residency requirement applicable to volunteer firefighters and ambulance workers under the new RPTL § 466-a. After we mentioned that we had received and responded to an email from a town attorney on this subject, we were asked to share a copy of our response. This is the response we provided, with the town name redacted:

The property tax is locally administered and the Department of Taxation and Finance does not have the authority to issue binding opinions with regard to exemption administration. That said, if I understand your question correctly, our short, informal, non-binding answer would be as follows: If an otherwise qualified applicant lives in [the town in question] and is an enrolled member of an incorporated volunteer fire company, fire department or incorporated voluntary ambulance service that serves [that town], then the applicant may receive the exemption authorized by the new RPTL 466-a, assuming the town has duly opted to offer that exemption. We see nothing in the statute that would render such an applicant ineligible on the basis that the portion of [the town] in which he or she lives is outside the portion of [the town] that is served by his or her incorporated volunteer fire company, fire department or incorporated voluntary ambulance service.

Further questions regarding eligibility for this exemption should be directed to your municipal attorney.

Reminder: Why you should purge your STAR credit markers

After school tax bills have been processed, you should purge STAR credit markers from your database. If you don’t remove the markers, the STAR check language may inappropriately display on the town and county tax roll and individual tax bills.

Note: While taxable values would not be impacted, STAR credits are income tax credits, and the names of credit recipients are not subject to public disclosure. While the law allows us to provide you with lists of STAR credit recipients, it also states that the information contained on these lists must be considered confidential and may not be subject to further disclosure under FOIL or otherwise.

We determine eligibility for the STAR credit annually. Therefore, you should not carry over STAR credit recipients from one year to the next.

To remove the markers, browse to the RPSV4 Updates section of the Online Assessment Community, and follow the instructions in the release notes for the STAR_credit_purge.exe file. If you are unable to run the executable, email your ORPTS customer service team.