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In the first three months of the year, the Peconic Bay Community Preservation Fund raked in $23.4 million—or 5.7 percent more than the first quarter of 2017—across the five East End towns, according to New York State Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr.’s office.
The CPF—funded by a 2 percent tax on real estate trades in East Hampton, Riverhead, Shelter Island, Southampton and Southold—is dedicated for preserving farmland and open space, creating parks, and addressing water quality issues.
Revenues in East Hampton and Southampton towns increased 6.6 percent and 6.9 percent, respectively. Southampton garnered the lion’s share of the funds, collecting $13.71 million.
However, the East End’s March 2018 total was lower year-over-year: $6.53 million compared to $7.36 million, an 11.3 percent dip.
Mr. Thiele said he attributes the overall first quarter gains to an unusually busy trading season in the East End real estate market.
“The high-end of the market has been strong and that has helped to generate funding for community preservation,” he said in an interview. “The one variable that is out there that I’d say we need to carefully monitor is the issue of whether the changes in federal tax law—the cap on state and local taxes as far as being a federal deduction, the cap on mortgage interests—will have an impact on the marketplace and community preservation.”
He said he doesn’t detect any issues that were reflected in the first quarter CPF report.
“And we only have three months to analyze—the first quarter. At least it’s a sample under the federal tax law but there hasn’t been any [impact] that we can detect yet. But I think we need a larger sample before we can come to any real judgments.”
Towns are continuously weighing how to use community preservation funds to address water quality issues, which was made possible by a 2016 referendum, Mr. Thiele said. Up to 20 percent of revenue may be used toward water quality initiatives, such as providing rebates for homeowners who replace cesspools with state-of-the-art septic systems.
All told, preservation fund revenues totaled $95.9 million in 2017, and $1.307 billion since the CPF’s inception in 1999. The record-holding year for the most CPF revenue was 2014, totaling $107.8 million.
The fund is set to expire in 2050.
JD Allen on May 3, 2018