Op-Ed: Senior, Disabled Tax Relief Changes Overdue, RTM Rep Says

On Monday, March 22, Fairfield’s RTM is scheduled to vote on revisions to the town’s tax relief ordinance for senior and disabled homeowners. Changes have been under consideration for over two years now and are well overdue. In November 2018, the RTM’s bipartisan tax relief subcommittee proposed revisions to address several deficiencies identified by the town’s tax assessor, senior advocacy groups, seniors, and two prior RTM subcommittees. We had aimed to increase participation, simplify the programs to ease administration and the application process, reduce inequities stemming from the asset limit, and increase benefits.

One of the most significant problems studied was the concerning levels of attrition to the program: In the span of eight years, participation in the program had dropped by nearly 20 percent, meaning that in 2018, we were helping significantly fewer seniors (1,343) than we had been in 2010 (1,656). Today, we only have 1,306 participants in our relief programs, which is less than the number of seniors the town helped in 1982. The Board of Finance recommendation that is now under consideration is an increase to the credit program benefit calculations, which will not expand program participation in any way but will only increase benefits for those already eligible for the programs in the lowest income categories. The Board of Finance recommendation leaves all of the other deficiencies unaddressed.

I will vote in support of the changes to the credit program that the Board of Finance has recommended not because I believe the Board of Finance arrived at the best or most efficient or most necessary changes, but because it’s simply time to get something done. Senior and disabled taxpayers have waited far too long for improved relief. And the town’s inaction in this area has undoubtedly driven seniors out of town who can no longer afford to live here, thereby hurting the town’s long term sustainability.

In my view, the revisions currently being considered do not constitute an expansion of relief in an historical context. The revisions will certainly help a segment of lower income seniors in town, but they will not expand participation. For that reason, I take issue with any characterization of these changes as an “expansion” of senior and disabled tax relief. In addition, while the budget shows a 15 percent increase to the amount budgeted for senior and disabled tax relief, bringing total tax loss to $4.2 million (from $3.7 million last year), this allotment merely restores tax relief to the levels that existed just four years ago and does not reach the levels budgeted seven years ago (in FY 2014 the town budgeted $4.6 million for senior and disabled tax relief).

My position has been and remains that it is in the town’s best interests to help ease tax burdens for as many seniors as possible. Losing seniors costs the town money in the long run: When seniors sell their homes, chances are, they sell to families with young children, whom the town will need to pay to educate. Investing in a relief program that helps to retain seniors is smart investment that ultimately saves the town money. In my extensive comparative research on other towns, I found that we are one of the only towns in this area that has experienced a decline in the percentage of seniors in our population. The two towns — Newtown and Redding — that allocated the highest percentage of their budgets to senior tax relief both experienced the greatest growth in their senior populations (each of those towns nearly doubling their senior populations since 2000). The towns of Easton, Redding, Ridgefield and Wilton all enable seniors in their towns with higher incomes to participate in their tax relief programs than Fairfield. The RTM’s tax relief subcommittee wanted to extend relief to seniors with incomes up to $90,000, which would have been competitive with several other towns’ relief programs (as well as New York state’s property relief program for seniors with incomes up to $90,550) and would have increased participation levels.

The decline in enrollment needs to be addressed. We need to help more seniors. And we need to make the programs more equitable and easier to administer (so that we don’t need a large staff to process these applications and monitor overly complex programs). We must enact the changes to the benefits calculations currently under consideration, but we must also commit ourselves to doing more work.

Jill Vergara

Fairfield Representative Town Meeting

Majority Leader Pro Tempore

Representative, District 7