12 C R Y D E R P O I N T FEBRUARY SANDY SLIGHT A glitch in the law is keeping co-op owners from receiving federal storm recovery grants 12 cryder point courier courier | FEBRUARY 2013 | WWW.QUEENSCOURIER.COM THE COURIER/Photo by Melissa Chan Local leaders want FEMA to make co-ops eligible for recovery grants. From left are Friedrich, City Councilmember Mark Weprin, Israel and State Senator Tony Avella. Co-op tax relief bill passed by legislature BY MELISSA CHAN The State Legislature has passed a long-awaited tax relief bill for city co-op and condo owners, despite a cluster of lawmakers who voted against it. The bill, approved by the State Senate and Assembly, includes raising a partial tax abatement from 17.5 percent to 25 percent and extending the J-51 program to June 30, 2015. The abatement reduces the difference in property taxes paid by Class 2 co-op and condo properties and one, two and three family homes in Class 1, and the J-51 gives owners partial property tax exemptions for capital improvements. “This is a major victory for the vast majority of co-op owners in northeast Queens, including thousands of senior citizens on fixed incomes,” said Assemblymember Ed Braunstein. But seven Democratic state senators and seven Democratic assemblymembers opposed the omnibus bill, which included a measure that gives tax abatements to 15 plots in midtown and downtown Manhattan being developed as luxury condominiums and office buildings. “This bill only benefits the rich,” said State Senator Ruben Diaz of the Bronx. “It is a multimillion dollar program of rent exemptions and abatement for landlords who renovate their buildings.” He said it does nothing to protect tenants. Diaz said he feared capital improvements under the J-51 program would lead to landlords raising rents on their tenants. “To vote for this bill, we might be sending the message, an impure message, that we are only working for the landlords and against the tenants,” Diaz said. State Senator Toby Ann Stavisky said she voted in favor of the bill because of the vital abatements to city co-op and condo owners but believed the abatements to luxury developments were a “giveaway of city money.” “The developers would be building this anyway. They don’t need the tax abatement,” she said. “We unfortunately can’t pick and choose the parts of the bill we want to vote for.” State Senator Brad Hoylman of Manhattan said he was “outraged” the abatement extensions were put into a packaged bill and “rushed through the Rules Committee onto the Senate floor with only 30 minutes’ notice.” “The bill subverted the normal committee process and required an ‘up or down’ vote, which was difficult as the bill contained some provisions that gave me and my Democratic colleagues pause,” he said. The bill requires another Senate vote before Governor Andrew Cuomo can sign it into law. Its assurances come after panic spread throughout co-op and condo communities at the end of June, when the Legislature adjourned session without extending the J-51 program and the expired abatement. Fear mounted in November after elected officials said the Legislature would not reconvene to pass promised relief. A pair of audits released last year by the city’s comptroller office found the Department of Finance at fault for causing upheavals in condo and co-op property values — a determining factor in property taxes — when it changed its formula for calculating them in fiscal year 2011-12. BY MELISSA CHAN A glitch in the law is keeping co-op owners from receiving federal storm recovery grants, officials said. According to Congressmember Steve Israel, co-ops are shouldering the costs of repair for Sandyinflicted damages because they are categorized as “business associations,” making them ineligible for federal grants — only loans. The Stafford Act, which governs how the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) responds to major disasters, does not include the word “co-op” in the law, Israel said. But there is no statute that purposefully bans co-op owners from being eligible for grants, a privilege given to homeowners. “FEMA is taking an overzealous interpretation to this,” said Israel. “It discriminates against co-op owners. It’s one thing to be devastated by a hurricane. It’s another to be devastated by a loophole.” Cryder Point Co-ops suffered $1 million in damage that left their waterfront community’s pier in shambles, said Phil Resnick, vice president of the co-op’s board of directors. More than half of the total buildings in Glen Oaks Village endured “moderate to severe shingle loss,” leading to $250,000 in infrastructural damages, said Bob Friedrich, the co-op’s president. The unbudgeted costs also include the removal of downed trees. “Housing co-ops are not business associations. We do not generate income based on corporate or private profit,” said Warren Schreiber, president of the Bay Terrace Community Alliance. “Many middle-class shareholders who are already experiencing financial difficulties will not be able to absorb the additional charges.”
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