Audit Finds Nearly $60 Million In Property Tax Breaks Given To Ineligible Owners

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- An audit by city Comptroller Scott Stringer has found tens of millions of dollars in property tax breaks went to dead people.

For the past four years, more than 3,200 properties in the five boroughs received tax breaks after the owners had died, the audit found.

The tax breaks were intended for low income seniors, but once they passed on, Stringer said the new owner or corporation that took over the property kept receiving them, WCBS 880's Marla Diamond reported.

Stringer blames the city's Department of Finance for not making recipients of the tax breaks reapply every two years as required by state law.

LINK: Read The Full Report

"Our audit found that the agency hadn't requested those reapplication's for the last 10 years," Stringer said. "As a result of that dramatic oversight, the city actually gave out $59.2 million in tax breaks to thousands of ineligible property owners."

Stringer has ordered the department to claw back the lost revenues.

"The Department of Finance was asleep at the wheel, the agency failed to even take the most basic steps," Stringer said. "The potential impact of this lost revenue is huge."