Socialist New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani wants to hike property taxes for \u201cricher and whiter neighborhoods\u201d in an eyebrow-raising proposal that aims to ease the burden on homeowners in the outer boroughs.<\/p>\n
The soak-the-rich proposal is buried in Mamdani\u2019s campaign platform<\/a> that calls to fix the city\u2019s notoriously skewed property tax system, in which ritzy brownstones are hit at lower rates than homes and rentals in lower-income neighborhoods.<\/p>\n \u201cShift the tax burden from overtaxed homeowners in the outer boroughs to more expensive homes in richer and whiter neighborhoods,\u201d the proposal reads.<\/p>\n Democratic nominee for New York City Mayor, Zohran Mamdani, plans to hike property taxes has drawn some concern that it will tax \u201cricher and whiter neighborhoods.\u201d ZUMAPRESS.com<\/p>\n Democrats and many Republicans have long pushed to fix the out-of-whack system that ends up hitting poorer, often largely black and brown neighborhoods, with higher property taxes than their neighbors in swanky areas that\u00a0tend to be majority Caucasian.<\/p>\n But Mamdani\u2019s specific mention of \u201cwhiter,\u201d wealthier neighborhoods drew outrage from some observers. Many right-wing commentators accused Mamdani, who would be the city\u2019s first mayor of South Asian descent if elected, of targeting white New Yorkers, with one labeling him a \u201cRACIST<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n City Councilman David Carr (R-Staten Island), who\u2019s part of the bipartisan push<\/a> to reform the property tax system, said Mamdani should tone down the \u201crhetoric\u201d if he\u2019s going to help tackle a very real imbalance.<\/p>\n \u201cThe objective of our reforms is to make our property tax system fairer and more transparent and to ensure that middle- and working-class homeowners aren\u2019t subsidizing lower taxes for wealthy property owners,\u201d Carr said.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not about blaming people based on race or class or political affiliation, and if Zohran Mamdani wants to come on board, then he should drop the divisive rhetoric.\u201d<\/p>\n Mamdani, 33, a two-term Queens assemblyman, pulled off a stunning upset<\/a> in Tuesday\u2019s ranked-choice Democratic mayoral primary, trouncing former Gov. Andrew Cuomo in first-pick votes after running an unabashedly socialist campaign<\/a> focused on affordability.<\/p>\n The city\u2019s tangled property tax rules are the result of a 50-year-old court decision, a subsequent state law setting assessment caps to prevent middle-class owners from being taxed out of their homes and a complicated set of overlapping rules.<\/p>\n The proposal is a part of Mamdani\u2019s campaign platform in a call to fix the tax system currently in place in the Big Apple. ZUMAPRESS.com<\/p>\n The result is a system where \u201csmall homeowners in Brooklyn and Queens can pay a higher tax rate than owners of luxury co-ops on 5th Avenue in Manhattan,\u201d the pro-reform group Tax Equity Now points out<\/a>.<\/p>\n Tax Equity Now New York filed a still-ongoing lawsuit against the city in 2017 that argued the process unfairly taxes renters and homeowners in lower-income neighborhoods compared to wealthier areas.<\/p>\n