For years, I have been fighting to fix New York City’s broken property tax system. I’m a veteran, a retired technology professional, and a homeowner in Southeast Queens who joined the Tax Equity Now New York (TENNY) lawsuit because I believed this city could finally deliver fairness. We filed a lawsuit against the city and state nearly nine years ago, to fix the unfairness and illegal system.
I’m now watching the third mayor in a row mislead New Yorkers about what is possible, what is legal, and what is fair. Mayor Mamdani campaigned on affordability and equity. He promised to fix a property tax system that punishes lower‑ and middle‑income homeowners, co‑op residents, and renters — especially in Black and Brown neighborhoods like mine.
Now, this mayor is proposing raising property taxes, making the broken system more unfair and punishing to working class homeowners. This is insanity.
The mayor’s plan to raise property taxes is a betrayal of the promises on which he ran. Others in city government see the problem. Comptroller Mark Levine has already called the plan “extreme,” pointing to aggressive revenue assumptions and the mayor’s shifting deficit narrative. My borough president, Donovan Richards, said it even more bluntly: Mamdani’s threat, if followed through, would “force people out of their home.
New Yorkers deserve honesty. They are still not receiving it to this present day.
Mamdani’s proposal is a bad one. But what is more troubling is that this mayor is doing what previous mayors have done — passing responsibility to Albany to reform the system. Last week in Albany, during his “Tin Cup” address, Mamdani made the incredible claim that “there are very few tools the city can do in and of itself” to address property tax reform, and that reform “must come from a partnership with Albany.”
That is not true. Maybe the mayor doesn’t know any better because of his youth and inexperience.
Because for our lawsuit, the courts have already ruled that New York City’s property tax system imposes substantially unequal burdens on similarly valued properties. The State of New York has argued — and the judge agreed — that the city has the authority to fix these inequities without new legislation.
This is not Albany’s problem. It is the city’s problem, and the city has the power to solve it.
Yet instead of addressing the lawsuit, the mayor is now going a step further, threatening to raise taxes inside the same broken structure that punishes working‑class communities. His logic here makes even less sense: if Mamdani agrees that the system is unequal, than raising taxes inside that unequal system only deepens inequality.
You cannot claim to champion working families while ignoring the legal case that shows they are being overcharged. You cannot claim to fight for affordability while proposing tax hikes that will hit the very communities you say you’re protecting.
New York City does not need to raise property taxes to fix inequity. It needs to fix inequity to avoid raising property taxes.
The mayor should stop misleading New Yorkers about what is possible. He should stop using “affordability” as a slogan while ignoring the lawsuit that proves the system is unfair. And he should stop pretending that raising taxes inside a discriminatory structure is anything other than a step backward.
Russell is a U.S. Marines Corps and Air National Guard veteran, a retired technology professional, and a plaintiff in the ongoing TENNY lawsuit against the City of New York.
