Ramapo, NY – The state’s highest court has denied hearing an appeal by a synagogue seeking a property-tax exemption for a rabbi’s residence.
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The Court of Appeals decided not to review a lower court ruling which, in part, found that a federal anti-poverty program was already paying $1,617 of Rabbi Baruch Moscowitz’s rent.
Justice Thomas Dickerson, ruled against Congregation Or Yosef in 2006 when he was in the state Supreme Court in White Plains.
“The congregation cannot seek two governmental subsidies for the same property,” Dickerson wrote then of receiving funds from the federal Section 8 Housing Voucher program, while also seeking a local property-tax exemption. “In addition,” Dickerson said at the time, “the credible evidence demonstrates that the congregation is making a profit from this arrangement.”
The town of Ramapo had calculated the profit as $381.68 per month, or $4,580.16 a year.
Besides the “double dipping” into taxpayer funds, as Dickerson put it, the lower court also sided with Ramapo’s account that the congregation violated zoning regulations.
Town Attorney Michael Klein has said inspectors found the violations when checking information that the congregation gave when it requested a tax exemption on the 32 College Road property. At the time, the congregation claimed it operated a synagogue, a mikvah, a shul, and residence for the rabbi and his family.
No site plans or permits had been sought, though, for anything beyond “a single-family dwelling with a finished basement,” Dickerson said.
The congregation’s arguments was that the building code violations had no connection to the validity of its request for a property-tax exemption.
Does this article, or the inspectors, claim a difference between a Synagogue AND a Shul? And does the congregation claim both are at the same parsonage?
If a finished basement can function as a room for many of these things in a parsonage house where is the problem?
What are the congregation’s heating costs and insurance costs for having the property?
Can the anti-poverty program funds be used for food or utility costs not included in rent?
“No site plans or permits had been sought, though, for anything beyond “a single-family dwelling with a finished basement,” Dickerson said”
How can they seek a tax exemption for a property without permits to operate as a shul? If it’s not a legal shul, there is no parsonage.
perhaps others in Rockland County will not be priced out of there homes becasue of excess taxes caused by phony shuls coming off the tax rolls.
Moshe, this is not a phony shul, go over and check for yourself, and maybe you can also daven mincha there and have a coffee..