By Brian McCready
Milford Bureau Chief
MILFORD — The Senior Tax Relief Committee Monday night approved an expanded tax relief plan, which would increase by 50 percent the number of seniors eligible, while adding another $300,000 in tax savings, members said.
The city now offers a $600 property tax break for single or disabled seniors with gross income of $29,800 or less, or married couples earning $36,500 or less. A total of 990 seniors participate in the senior property tax program costing the city $557,000.
The committee voted unanimously to increase the income guidelines for singles and married couples by $10,000 each. So if the Board of Aldermen adopts the recommendation, any single or disabled senior earning $39,800, or married couple earning $46,500 or less, will be eligible for a $600 property tax break.
Alderman Philip Vetro, D-4, said the Ordinance Committee would expedite the process for review and schedule a special meeting to discuss the senior tax proposal.
Committee Chairman George Amato said he was informed by the assessor’s office that increasing the income guidelines by $10,000 would allow 50 percent more seniors to qualify for the tax relief, and it would cost about an additional $300,000.
Altogether, the city would be projected to provide about 1,350 seniors almost $900,000 in tax relief.
Amato said there was talk of increasing the $600 property tax break that eligible seniors receive, but then the tax relief could soar well beyond $1 million.
“You’re in a period of where everyone is looking to cut,” Amato said. “This will be a very difficult budget year.”
In a letter signed by all members of the Senior Tax Relief Committee to aldermanic Chairman Ben Blake, D-5, the members requested he reappoint another committee after the approval of next year’s budget in May. Also, the members ask that the issue of age and residency requirements be debated.
Amato said because people are working longer, the eligibility age for senior tax relief may be pushed from 65 to 70. Also, he said someone is eligible for senior tax relief after residing just one year in Milford, and it might be prudent to amend that to five years.
Amato said Blake and Mayor James L. Richetelli Jr. have expressed a desire to implement additional senior tax relief in the short-term.
Joseph Prisco, a senior tax relief advocate, said this was the “best plan thus far,” and he is all for increasing the age and residency requirements.
“They raised the income guidelines and that’s a start,” Prisco said.
Committee member Kerri Rowland said that it was the “major consideration of this committee to balance the needs of all taxpayers with the needs of some of the most vulnerable seniors.”

By James Tinley
Register Staff
MILFORD — The few working farms left in the city could get some much needed help if a plan to offer farmers a break on city taxes is approved by the Board of Aldermen.
The city attorney is reviewing a proposal to grant tax relief to working farms, and it will be up for aldermanic approval as early as next month, Mayor James L. Richetelli Jr. said Thursday.
The plan would give a property tax exemption on certain farm-related buildings on land used exclusively for farming. The farms must have at least 3 working acres that provide a significant source of income.
There are about seven farms that fit that description, said Letty Malone, former chairwoman of the Conservation Commission, and one of the people who brought the proposal to the mayor.
The proposal would take advantage of existing legislation that allows local municipalities to approve the tax break for farms.
“I think it’s another way of the city saying to the farmers ‘we value you, and we want to give you any advantage we can to keep you in business,’” Malone said. “There’s a great concern we’re going to lose a lot of the farms.”
Richetelli said the cost to the city would be minimal, and estimates that it would lose about $10,000 annually in tax revenue. “It won’t cost the city very much at all, but it may make a big difference to a farmer,” Richetelli said.
He added that if a farm were to remain as a viable business, the land is less likely to be sold to housing developers.
“I look at it as an environmentalist as a great way to save open spaces,” Malone said.
Besides environmental benefits, “the general character of the community is enhanced by having the ability to drive around and see farms and open spaces,” she said.

By Brian McCready
Milford Bureau Chief
MILFORD — Recreation Director William McCarthy says he wants to meet with representatives of all the city’s youth leagues to create a database to ensure volunteer coaches do not possess serious criminal records.
For the past several months, the city’s Park, Beach, and Recreation Commission has been discussing a plan to ensure there is a mechanism in place to screen volunteer coaches for youth programs.
“My belief is that it would benefit every youth organization to share information with everyone,” McCarthy said. “It would reduce duplication.”
McCarthy said he envisions creating a database that would keep records of anyone who applies for a volunteer coaching position. He said since some youth sport leagues perform background checks, it’s not necessary for those coaches who have been vetted to pay for the same service again.
“It’s a no-brainer. It will save the taxpayers and the coaches money,” McCarthy said.
He said he believes the background checks should cover three specific areas including whether someone is a convicted sex offender, or has been arrested for domestic violence or child abuse. He said a complete criminal background check that includes motor vehicle and civil offenses will cost $200, and isn’t realistic.
McCarthy said he believes he can get the cost down to $25 per person. He said he believes the new policy would affect about 200 people who would have to screened for 80 youth basketball teams.
The issue of criminal background checks surfaced in September after former youth coach Robert Dulin, 49, was sentenced to 18 months in prison. The judge did not bar Dulin from volunteering or acting as a coach in any organization involving adolescent girls in the future.
Dulin, a former recreational league coach, engaged in a three-year illegal affair with a then-high school student whom he coached in a summer basketball camp. The affair began when the girl was 15-years-old.
Officials say they hope to have a final policy in place by the end of summer, including a company to perform the background checks.

By James Tinley
Register Staff
MILFORD — Republican Mayor James L. Richetelli Jr. and aldermanic Chairman Ben Blake, D-5, want to bring a senior tax relief plan to the city, but the two are at odds over the best way to create that plan.
Blake announced his appointment of a five-member ad hoc committee to tackle the issue of senior tax relief at Monday’s aldermanic meeting.
Richetelli pledged his full cooperation Tuesday, but said he is reserving judgment on the committee, and added he has reservations about Blake’s choice to form the committee.
Richetelli, who has already presented an expansion to an existing senior tax relief plan, would have rather seen the Ordinance Committee study the issue, because any ordinance has to be approved there first before making it to the Board of Aldermen.
“It appears to me that the ad hoc committee is setting up a middleman,” Richetelli said. “It bogs down the process.” Blake said he acted only after Richetelli failed to set up a committee and established his own with the charge of looking at different communities’ plans to find the best fit for Milford.
“It’s in the city’s best interest to look at a wide range of proposals, not just what the mayor put forth,” Blake said. It’s important to cast a wide net.”
A proposal to have the Ordinance Committee study a senior tax relief plan came from the mayor’s office in January, Richetelli said. This is months after he first brought up the issue, Blake said.
“I would have preferred the committee been appointed earlier,” Blake said. “I think it’s been prejudiced a little bit because for the last four or five months they could have been able to do their study.”
Richetelli, who announced a plan to expand senior tax relief in September, said he didn’t want to politicize the issue by conducting the study during the months before the election. “I don’t think good government policy comes out two months before an election,” he said.
The committee is composed of the former aldermanic Chairman George Amato; Richetelli’s Democratic mayoral challenger Kerri Rowland; Gerald Dowd and Mary Ann Griffin, who were both involved in senior advocacy in the city, and Michal Zabinski, a Fairfield University professor, Blake said. Amato has been appointed chairman.
Richetelli’s plan broadens the income guidelines, which will allow more people qualify. The number of people who will qualify is unknown, making it impossible to determine to the cost of the program, Richetelli said. He proposed a census be taken to nail down the figures. With a great deal of work to be done before a plan is established Richetelli said, “It’s up to committee to decide,” if a plan will be in place for this year.
James Tinley can be reached at jtinley@nhregister.com or 876-3030.

By James Tinley
Register Staff
MILFORD — The grand list received an “extremely healthy” bump, Mayor James L. Richetelli Jr. said Friday, and he predicted that growth will continue as more major tax-generating projects come onto the tax rolls.
The 2007 grand list rose from $7.1 billion to $7.2 billion, which amounts to a 1.96 percent increase from 2006. But that is when the total value of the five-year phased-in housing revaluation is factored in, Richetelli said. The city is in the second year of the phase-in, which sets the actual grand list for 2007 at $5.3 billion. This reflects a 17 percent increase in total taxable property from 2006, said City Assessor Daniel Thomas.
But Thomas was quick to downplay the substantial figure for the percentage of growth to the grand list and said it is skewed by not adjusting for the revaluation. He said the 1.96 percent increase is a more accurate reflection of the added revenue to the city.
One of the largest additions the tax rolls was the Milford Crossing shopping complex, which is anchored by Wal-Mart. The $78.6 million that Milford Crossing contributed to the tax rolls in 2007 makes it the city’s second-largest taxpayer, behind the Westfield Connecticut Post mall. The tax money Milford Crossing brought into the city also accounts for almost 75 percent of the growth to the city’s real estate value.
Revenue drawn from motor vehicle taxes rose by 1.7 percent, which Thomas sees as an indication that people are still buying new cars. He said this was in indication of the strength of the economy in the area, despite what many are characterizing as tough economic times.
With more major tax contributors expected to come on the books in the coming months and years, Richetelli said, “I’m fairly optimistic (the growth) will continue in the future.”
Those projects include taxes generated from power lines that are strung through Milford, the Devon Power Station’s plans to put two new natural gas burning generators online, as well as the extension of the Iroquois natural gas pipeline. A newly approved fuel cell power plant is also expected to add tax revenue.
On the commercial side, a Lowe’s home improvement store, a Pilgrim furniture store, as well as three new hotels and a conference center planned for the city will also continue to add to the tax rolls in the future.
Aldermanic Chairman Ben Blake, D-5, said a “good, healthy grand list is only one part of the equation,” and called on Richetelli to stem “out of control spending.”
The 2007 Top 10 net assessments: Westfield Connecticut Post mall, $176.6 million; Milford Crossing Investors LLC, $78.1 million; Smith Craft Real Estate, $55.6 million; Crown Milford LLC, $37.7 million; Connecticut Light & Power, $35 million; Schick Manufacturing, $27.5 million; D’Amato Investments LLC, $27.1 million; JP Construction/Avalon Bay, $25.4 million; Keystone Milford LLC, $19.9 million, and Milford Plaza Associates LLC, $16.6 million.