It begins when the bulldozer arrives, and, in short order, the little cottage is demolished. As you glance out the window of your modest home, a huge house with numerous bathrooms and bedrooms, and every possible amenity, appears in its place.
As the Southampton Town Board contemplates the tax assessment issue, I hope its members realize that longtime residents with simple homes get swept up because their new neighbors have built their weekend mansions.
In Flanders, Hampton Bays, East Quogue, North Sea and Noyac, houses are selling for high prices, and the assessments are inflated. Just because your new neighbor is a millionaire, it does not change your finances.
High selling prices and high assessments are great, but only if you want to move. Longtime residents with homes that have not been improved or expanded should not be victims of a neighborhood that is now highly sought after.
There should be a mechanism to protect senior citizens and longtime residents from drastic potential huge increases in assessments. Any plan should be fair, equitable and transparent and comply with the New York State Office of Real Property Services.
The Town Board must be creative, innovators not imitators, as they seek a solution. Our full-time residents should not have to call the moving company and leave what is left of our hometown.
Greg Robins
North Sea