Bonacic charges Lumberland supervisor is angling for re-election

By DAVID HULSE

GLEN SPEY — In his first response to a series of recent critical comments about the state’s handling of Lumberland efforts to impose user fees on not-for-profit properties, state Senator John Bonacic (R-40) accused Supervisor John LiGreci, also a Republican, of “pandering.”

“He’s up for re-election this year,” Bonacic said flatly on April 22.

Discounting the possibility of making any useful progress by pursuing the issue as LiGreci proposed, the senator said the user fee issue has never been instituted because it is unconstitutional.

However, Bonacic said there have been many instances of “land banking” by not-for-profits over the years, and he is attempting to get some relief with legislation now in the works. His bill would transfer the tax burden for portions of the property back onto not-for-profit owners of parcels in excess of 300 acres, if those owners cannot demonstrate that the entire parcel is used for not-for-profit purposes.

LiGreci was on vacation in Florida and unavailable for comment.

In the past, the Supervisor charged that state officials, including the Governor, Office of Real Property Services and Senator Bonacic, had promised meetings to discuss the issue and then given the town “a runaround” by delaying, finally canceling the meeting, and then denying that any meeting was ever scheduled.

LiGreci said the original idea came from Rep. Benjamin Gilman’s (R-20-NY) office and Gilman’s staff initiated efforts for a meeting of interested parties on behalf of the town a year ago.

Bonacic said his office contacted Gilman’s, and they mutually agreed about the constitutional problems with the fees.

Promising he would not let the fee question rest, earlier this month LiGreci said he would contact the NYS Association of Towns and individual towns in an effort to have them designate him as their spokesperson on the issue.