Syracuse, N.Y. — The public gets a chance to be heard on a proposed Syracuse law that would create new steps to protect constitutional rights of people who lose their property for unpaid taxes.
Mayor Ben Walsh has set a public hearing for 10 a.m. Tuesday, Jan. 30, on the local law that would change how the city seizes real estate. The Syracuse Common Council on Monday approved the law, which was crafted by Walsh’s administration in response to a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling.
The new law would establish a process in which owners who lose their property for delinquent taxes would be able to recover funds if the seized real estate is worth more than the tax debt.
The nation’s highest court ruled in a Minnesota case last May that property tax foreclosure laws in 10 states, including New York, are unconstitutional because they violate the Fifth Amendment. In a lawsuit filed by a Minnesota condo owner who lost her home over $15,000 in tax debt, the Supreme Court’s said she was entitled to the extra $25,000 in proceeds a county realized when it sold the property for $40,000.
For the past decade, Syracuse has been foreclosing on tax-delinquent properties and turning them over to the Greater Syracuse Land Bank without a way for original owners to get paid for surplus value. The land bank spends its own money to stabilize properties, such as boarding up broken windows and cleaning up overgrown brush, and then markets them to to responsible owners who would spend money to fully renovate and maintain them. In many cases, land bank properties acquired from city foreclosures are demolished because of their deteriorating condition and marketed for new construction.
To allow the arrangement with the land bank to move forward in a way that complies with the Supreme Court’s decision, the city paused foreclosures to develop a new step in the foreclosure process. The new law requires an additional notice a month before a seizure giving owners 30 days to file a claim for…
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