planned tax on secondary homes<\/a> was dealt a major setback Tuesday after a Staten Island judge ruled in favor of the plaintiffs challenging the rollout.\n <\/p>\n\n The pied-\u00e0-terre tax, which places a surcharge on non-primary residences in New York City valued over $5 million, as well as co-ops valued at $1 million or more, was rolled out as part of Mayor Zohran Mamdani\u2019s 2027 fiscal year budget in an attempt to close the city\u2019s budget gap. Gov. Kathy Hochul had backed the idea.\n <\/p>\n
\n Mamdani, who took office in January, promised to \u201cgovern as a democratic socialist\u201d and campaigned on plans to make the city more affordable and improve New Yorkers\u2019 daily lives. In his first few months in office, he delivered a rent freeze for tenants in rent-stabilized apartments across the city.\n <\/p>\n
\n The plaintiffs in the lawsuit did not challenge the legality of the tax itself, but rather the rollout. Three petitioners alleged the city had incorrectly \u201cidentified their homes as potentially subject to the surcharge,\u201d despite being their primary residences.\n <\/p>\n
\n The city\u2019s Department of Finance website posted a tax roll in July that included names and addresses of over 900,000 New York City homeowners, even if they were not subject to the tax.\n <\/p>\n
\n Judge Wayne M. Ozzi of Richmond County ruled the roll must be removed from the website, but can be replaced with a secondary roll \u201creflecting those properties actually subject to the surcharge.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n Approximately 17,000 notices were also mailed to residents at the start of the process, which notified them that they would need to file for exemption or be subject to the tax. Tuesday\u2019s ruling came one week before the October 6 exemption deadline.\n <\/p>\n
\n Those previously mailed notices must be canceled as well, Ozzi ruled. New notices can be mailed in compliance with a list of rules, including that they can only be mailed only after \u201cindividualized initial determination utilizing any and all resources and information\u201d available to the Department of Finance.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cWe\u2019re gratified that the court has recognized we were right all along. The fact is that this administration failed to follow state law when it burdened New York City homeowners with proving they live in their own homes or be on the hook for paying a new surcharge,\u201d Randy Mastro, an attorney representing the plaintiffs, said in a statement following Tuesday\u2019s ruling.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cNow the administration must go back and do what it should have done from the start: use all the information at its disposal to make an individualized \u2018initial determination\u2019 about who truly owes this surcharge before demanding that they pay it.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n A spokesperson for Mamdani said in a statement the decision was \u201cwrong.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cThe pied-\u00e0-terre surcharge is about a basic principle of fairness: if you can afford a luxury second home in New York City, you can afford to pay your fair share for the schools, streets and parks that make this city work,\u201d Matt Rauschenbach said.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cOur Administration is fighting every day to deliver for working New Yorkers. The ultra-wealthy are fighting in court to avoid paying their fair share. They have filed lawsuit after lawsuit to protect their privilege, and we will not back down.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n The city appealed the ruling Tuesday evening, a city official told CNN, invoking a stay and allowing it to continue with the implementation of the surcharge while the lower court\u2019s order is on pause.\n <\/p>\n
\n In addition to the plaintiffs\u2019 win in Richmond County, others are still looking to challenge the law\u2019s constitutionality.\n <\/p>\n
\n Also Tuesday, a group of Suffolk County homeowners and a co-op sued New York State over the pied-\u00e0-terre tax, arguing the law \u201cunlawfully discriminates against nonresidents, applies retroactively, and imposes unconstitutional burdens on homeowners and cooperative buildings.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n The lawsuit also expressed concern over the roll and mail notices \u2013 that Ozzi ruled must be canceled \u2013 arguing the process \u201ccreated widespread confusion, raised privacy concerns, and improperly shifted the burden onto homeowners to prove eligibility for an exemption.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
\n This story has been updated with additional information.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New York\u00a0\u2014\u00a0 New York City\u2019s planned tax on secondary homes was dealt a major setback Tuesday after a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":361663,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[9,24,55,54,56],"class_list":["post-361662","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-city-headlines","tag-new-york-city-news","tag-ny"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/361662","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=361662"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/361662\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/361663"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=361662"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=361662"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=361662"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}