Opinion
CA 04-02930.
April 29, 2005.
Appeal from a judgment (denominated order) of the Supreme Court, Erie County (Kevin M. Dillon, J.), entered May 21, 2004 in a proceeding pursuant to CPLR article 78. The judgment dismissed the petition.
HINMAN STRAUB P.C., ALBANY (THOMAS D. LATIN OF COUNSEL), FOR PETITIONER-APPELLANT.
MICHAEL B. RISMAN, CORPORATION COUNSEL, BUFFALO (ALAN P. GERSTMAN OF COUNSEL), FOR RESPONDENTS-RESPONDENTS.
Present — Pigott, Jr., P.J., Gorski, Smith, Pine and Lawton, JJ.
It is hereby ordered that the judgment so appealed from be and the same hereby is unanimously affirmed without costs.
Memorandum: Petitioner, a for-profit organization, owns real property in the City of Buffalo that it leased to a charter school for an annual rent of $848,000. Petitioner applied to respondent Martin F. Kennedy, as Assessor of the City of Buffalo, for, inter alia, a real property tax exemption pursuant to RPTL 420-a on the ground that its lease to the charter school entitled it to a tax exemption. We agree with Supreme Court that the application was properly denied on the ground that a charter school is entitled to a tax exemption to the same extent as public schools and public schools are exempt on real property they own ( see Education Law § 2853 [d]; RPTL 408; see generally Board of Educ., Hewlett-Woodmere Union Free School Dist. v. Board of Assessors of County of Nassau, 54 AD2d 978, lv denied 41 NY2d 805).