[Adopted 11-1-1983 by L.L. No. 17-1983]
A. 
This article is enacted in recognition of the services and sacrifices of veterans in the service of their country. It is enacted pursuant to authority granted in § 458, Subdivision 5(b), of the Real Property Tax Law,[1] which delegates authority to local governments to enact local laws to provide a proportional increase in exemptions previously granted to eligible veterans at the time of, or in any subsequent year to, a voluntary full-value reassessment of all real property.
[1]
Editor's Note: Subdivision 5(b) of § 458 of the Real Property Tax Law was redesignated Subdivision 5(a) by L. 1984, c. 525.
B. 
Veterans exemptions were originally granted by the State Legislature at a time when most real property was assessed at fractional rates or when land values were lower. Inflation that has occurred subsequent to the granting of such exemptions has greatly increased the values of the properties for which such exemptions were granted and would have progressively diminished the benefit accorded by the State Legislature for veterans exemptions. The voluntary reassessment in 1982 of all properties within the Village of Chittenango has now cast upon the veterans an additional burden that the Legislature apparently intended to obviate by the creation of the veterans exemption.
C. 
The village's voluntary choice of full-value reassessment was in major part due to court determinations that full-value assessments were necessary and proper; and the village's decisions to undertake such reassessment had the unanticipated result of depriving veterans of the just exemption that they had earned by their service.
D. 
The Legislature has extended the authority to enact local laws to continue to provide veterans with a proportionate exemption comparable to that enjoyed by such veterans prior to voluntary reassessment. Since the Legislature, in its wisdom, has deemed veterans to be eligible for extraordinary relief, the village deems it appropriate that such relief should be accorded for the duration of the legislative authority now in existence.
All veterans exemptions in existence on the date when real property in the Village of Chittenango was voluntarily reassessed to one-hundred-percent valuation are hereby proportionately increased in the same proportion as the total assessed value of all real property in the Village of Chittenango was increased in that year.
The increase in exemptions granted herein shall take effect for all years subsequent to enactment of this article, provided that state legislative authority for such increase is continued.