Assemblyman Christopher S. Friend (R,C,I,Ref-Big Flats) saw legislation he cosponsored to revert the STAR program back to a reimbursement that unanimously passed the state Assembly yesterday.

“It’s great to see that the Assembly has seen the light and is correcting last year’s ill-conceived and heavily flawed law that merely served as an accounting gimmick for the governor,” Friend said. “Last year, the state changed the STAR program from a reimbursement to a tax credit, or check program. It also changed from local accountability at the assessor’s office to being state controlled. This created numerous issues at the local level for compliance, as the assessors did not have access to the state's database. After numerous constituents across the state have reached out to legislative members to ask why their checks were in many cases five months late and occasionally riddled with errors, the Assembly unanimously passed bill A.5969 to go back to the old system that was working without issue. The bill now moves to the Senate before it can become law.”

Assemblyman Friend serves as the Ranking Minority Member on the Assembly Committee on Local Government.