The NJ Tax Blog

Governor Eliot Spitzer’s second State of the State Speech today will likely appoint a bipartisan commission to study property tax reform in New York. It was originally expected that the Governor would seek to impose caps that would limit by law the amount that one’s property tax bill could be increased. It now appears that the Governor will stop short of calling for a cap, but will appoint a bipartisan commission instead. In order to provide a little insight as to what today’s speech will discuss, the Governor stated: “The entire thrust of what this State of the State is going to be about is, how do we bring back and revitalize the economy of New York State? What are the inputs? What are the investments? What is the new strategic thinking we need to embrace? This is example 1A of how you do it."

Time will tell if this new bipartisan commission will contribute to New York’s stand-still bureaucracy or if it will be an effective tool in the Governor’s arsenal to address New York’s current Property Tax quandary.