A Long Island suburb found itself suddenly without a mayor \u2014 or nearly any government at all \u2014 when almost all the town\u2019s top officials resigned Thursday after raising property taxes 87%.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Atlantic Beach\u2019s longtime Mayor George Pappas abruptly stepped down alongside Deputy Mayor Charles Hammerman barely two months after causing a firestorm with a nearly 90% property tax hike \u2014 and just days after a nearly $1 million legal settlement was approved by the village board of trustees.<\/p>\n
The massive payout was part of a federal discrimination lawsuit against the municipality by Chabad Lubavitch of the Beaches \u2014 a Jewish organization that purchased a former Capital One bank in 2021 to serve as a synagogue and community center that they said is being antisemitically stonewalled by the local government.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Atlantic Beach\u2019s longtime Mayor George Pappas quit after jacking up property taxes by 87%. Village of Atlantic Beach<\/p>\n
The resignations leave Atlantic Beach temporarily in the hands of just three trustees, but two of them, Patricia Beaumont and Nathan Etrog, are out the door next Monday when newly elected trustees Joseph B. Pierantoni and Laura Heller are sworn in. <\/p>\n
The pair won their seats in last month\u2019s village elections.<\/p>\n
That means by next week, just one member of the current board \u2014 Barry Frohlinger \u2014 will remain in office, effectively leaving the village\u2019s leadership in a state of near-collapse as residents demand answers over how things spiraled so quickly.<\/p>\n
Calls for Pappas\u2019 resignation have been brewing since May, when village officials blindsided homeowners with an 87% spike in property taxes \u2014 a move they blamed on decades of flawed assessment practices by Nassau County.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But the county pushed back hard, and told The Post the village itself was at fault for improperly billing commercial properties for years, essentially linking the hike to a years-long administrative goof-up.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cNassau County is not responsible for the Village of Atlantic Beach budget or tax levy, nor do we calculate, bill, collect or distribute village taxes,\u201d said County Assessor Joseph Adamo.<\/p>\n
Deputy Mayor Charles D. Hammerman also resigned from his position. Village of Atlantic Beach<\/p>\n
Some residents suspect the sky-high tax hike was less about assessment errors and more about covering the legal fees from the village\u2019s bitter and expensive legal fight with the Chabad.<\/p>\n
When village leaders first learned of the plan to build the Chabad, they swiftly moved to block it, launching eminent domain proceedings to seize the building for a village-run facility, leading to a lawsuit the village has largely been on the losing end of by the organization accusing officials of religious discrimination.<\/p>\n
Earlier this week, the board quietly approved a $950,000 settlement with the Chabad on top of the more than $500,000 the village has already spent in legal fees \u2014 and within 48 hours, both the mayor and his deputy were gone.<\/p>\n
East Atlantic Beach, New York, has found itself with nearly no government at all. jrossphoto \u2013 stock.adobe.com<\/p>\n
\u201cWe shouldn\u2019t be footing the bill for their antisemitism,\u201d one resident fumed to The Post.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The village\u2019s board did not respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Long Island suburb found itself suddenly without a mayor \u2014 or nearly any government at all \u2014…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":38316,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,12648,336,6084,5248,7834,405,403,5226,5225,5228,5227,30909,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-38315","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-antisemitism","10":"tag-lawsuits","11":"tag-long-island","12":"tag-metro","13":"tag-nassau-county","14":"tag-new-york","15":"tag-new-york-city","16":"tag-newyork","17":"tag-newyorkcity","18":"tag-ny","19":"tag-nyc","20":"tag-politicians","21":"tag-united-states","22":"tag-united-states-of-america","23":"tag-unitedstates","24":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","25":"tag-us","26":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114795538245644318","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38315","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38315"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38315\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38316"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}