Lumberland will be a difficult splinter to ignore

By DAVID HULSE

GLEN SPEY — Lumberland Supervisor John LiGreci says he’s seen the smoke and mirrors of state politics now, but he will not quit until he gets answers about property tax reforms for his town.

LiGreci, for about a year now, has been trying to organize a meeting of state and federal officials to detail ways to implement a user fee, a payment principally to be levied against tax-exempt owners of large tracts, for municipal services like road maintenance, police and other services.

The user fee had been suggested by Rep. Ben Gilman’s office, but Gilman has had little success getting state officials to the table. A political power struggle, said to be ongoing between Gilman and Governor George Pataki, over appointments to the federal bench may be involved.

When a meeting was finally scheduled for the end of February, then cancelled with a denial from one Office of Real Property Services (ORPS) official, Paul Miller who said that he had never even known of such a meeting, LiGreci lost patience.

LiGreci said Gilman’s office expressed “disappointment” at the outcome, but had documentation of the meeting and those who were to attend.

“I truly feel that ORPS, Senator [John] Bonacic, and Governor Pataki were giving us the best, most professional runaround that I’ve ever seen,” LiGreci reported at the town board’s March 14 meeting.

LiGreci said he would not let the matter rest and would take his case before the Sullivan County Supervisors Association, in an effort to find a larger voice of complaint. “I’m not going to let our people continue to be sitting ducks for these not-for-profits,” he said.