“I believe it is time that Chemung County joins our surrounding counties and adopts the Veterans Property Tax Exemption for the Cold War Era Veterans who own a home in our county. It covers those veterans who served from 1945 to 1991. A 15% property tax exemption is the least we can do to thank those brave men and women who served our country,” Strange said. “It is time to honor all those who served our country during time of war and peace.”
“This has been an ongoing issue with Cold War Era veterans since the law was passed in 2008. We have had many people come address the legislature since them asking that we pass it. We even had the Commander of one of the American Legions speak to the legislature. The Chemung County Veterans Affairs Office was one of the first places I visited when I became a legislator to learn about this issue. I’ve done my research. The current County Executive does not support bringing this to the legislature. I hope the next one does. A number of those that would be eligible is not known. They have 30,000 files they would have to go through to come up with that number. Then you would have find out if they own a home. The cost would be determined by how many actually applied for the exemption. That amount would then be spread out over all the taxable property in the county. It would not cost any municipality any money,” Strange said.