At a press conference Jan. 18, Nassau County District Attorney (DA) Denis Dillon and Harvey Levinson, chairman of the Nassau County Board of Assessors, announced plans to utilize the prosecutorial and investigative resources of the DA's office to assist Nassau County's town and city governments in the prosecution of illegal housing.

Dillon, in meeting with Levinson on several occasions regarding the seriousness of illegal housing within Nassau County, said he will be offering his assistance and has agreed on a plan to supplement the efforts of town attorneys engaged in detecting and prosecuting illegal housing cases within the Towns of Oyster Bay, North Hempstead, Hempstead and the Cities of Glen Cove and Long Beach.

"Each town and city will receive assistance tailored to its individual needs. Generally, I will be providing extra legal and investigative help to the towns and cities, focusing on their most serious or protracted cases," said Dillon. "Although my assistance is limited by budgetary restraints, I believe we have agreed upon a course of action which will best utilize the resources I can make available."

Levinson said, "I am indeed honored that the district attorney has embraced my suggestion to use the power, prestige and resources of his office to assist local governments in combating the huge, black-market illegal housing industry in Nassau County. I am not here to use this platform to criticize local government. Rather my goal is to have the elected officials from the county, towns, cities and villages use the district attorney's offer of assistance as the catalyst to find solutions for this seemingly intractable problem."

According to the district attorney, his office will help in the execution of existing bench warrants and will assist in identifying and locating the owners of the most egregious offenders in the Town of Hempstead. Pertaining to the Oyster Bay and North Hempstead Towns as well as Glen Cove and Long Beach, Dillon said the DA's office "will assist by investigating and prosecuting the owners of multiple family dwellings."

"I am happy that we are able to assist the towns and cities with this matter," said Dillon. "I believe our assistance will help them in their quest to combat illegal housing in their respective areas."

Since 2004, the assessors office - through either residential complaints, fire department and police reports or their own investigations - has uncovered 16 dwellings (see sidebar) throughout Nassau County that either had four or more illegal apartments or were being used as rooming houses. "I have embarked on a plan to tax these properties at the higher, commercial tax rate (from Class 1 - residential to Class 4 - commercial)," said Levinson. "This action has caused a much needed spotlight and increased public awareness of the consequences of illegal housing in the midst of middle-income communities throughout the county."

With a home at 25 Hudson Street in Long Beach divided into some 13 rooms at an average monthly rent of $500 per room, officials allege that the homeowner earned between $75,000 and $80,000 a year. "The life blood of illegal housing, in my opinion, is the profits generated by the huge rents, often paid in cash," said Levinson. "This is big business." He added that when the assessor's office finds homeowners they believe are running illegal boarding houses a referral is sent to the Nassau County Office of Internal Revenue Services.

"The proliferation of illegal apartments is not only generating higher school and garbage taxes within the towns, but is impacting police and fire department budgets and resources based on the disproportionate and excessive number of calls to these properties," said Levinson.

Joining the district attorney and assessor at the press conference were Hempstead Town Supervisor Kate Murray, Oyster Bay Town Supervisor John Venditto, North Hempstead Town Supervisor Jon Kaiman, Glen Cove Mayor Mary Ann Holzkamp and Long Beach City Manager Charles Theofan who all agreed that the various levels of government will be most effective in combating illegal apartments if they work cooperatively.

In the Town of Oyster Bay, Supervisor Venditto said efforts are being made to provide affordable housing so that both seniors and young people can remain in their hometowns. The supervisor added that he commends the district attorney for offering the services of his office to assist the Town of Oyster Bay. "We will be working closely with him to prosecute the owners of these illegal properties," said Supervisor Venditto. "There is always room for improvement [and] you never look a gift horse in the mouth. I can assure the district attorney of Nassau County that we will avail ourselves fully to the resources that he is offering."

Joining with the DA's office is yet another notch in the county's belt in the fight against illegal housing. Recently, a bill written by Senator Dean Skelos and Assemblyman Harvey Weisenberg and signed into law by Governor George Pataki, has given Nassau town supervisors another effective weapon. With the new law, named "Nail and Mail," municipal workers will no longer be forced to serve a landlord personally with a court appearance ticket for violations. The law allows municipal building inspectors to post a summons at the location of an alleged illegal occupancy and serve a duplicate summons by certified mail after three unsuccessful attempts have been made to personally serve the property owner.

Additionally, in September 2004, Levinson presented the media with four initiatives he hopes will be put forth to combat illegal housing throughout the county. Levinson's proposals include changing the sworn affidavits landlords must sign when taking a tenant to court for either eviction or back rent purposes; preventing landlords from collecting back rent from tenants unless they produce proof the residence is a rental property; asking the New York State Department of State to discipline real estate brokers who advertise illegal apartments; and the chance of either losing their fire insurance or paying extremely high rates.

In October 2004, Levinson announced a proposal to eliminate the school property tax altogether and replace it with a modest income tax that would be paid for by both owners and renters. By eliminating the school property tax, Levinson said Nassau County would also be able to eliminate the STAR program since there would be no need for STAR because there are no taxes. He also said that the money the government appropriates to STAR could then be added to state aid to offset districts that may need additional support as a result of collecting lower income taxes.

In addition, Levinson announced he was looking to establish a set commercial property school tax rate throughout the county for all school districts. Through this set rate, the assessor said tax monies collected can be redistributed to all school districts under a revenue sharing formula. Levinson's ideas were drawn up in a proposal to be sent to Albany and reviewed by Governor George Pataki.

With illegal housing providing homes for many who cannot afford to live elsewhere, cracking down may leave poor or immigrant residents displaced. "People will be thrown out on the street. People will be made homeless as a result of this crackdown. There's no doubt about it. If you enforce your codes to the letter of the law, you will be putting people out into the street," said Supervisor Kaiman. "However, we have an added responsibility to try to help people who are displaced. In the town of North Hempstead we are pursuing programs to help people make the transition. We don't have all the answers so we have to be prepared for the consequences."

He added, "On the other hand, we are not helping people who are living in unsafe housing where they are subject to horrible and dangerous living conditions by letting them live in a bedroom that is going to go up in flames or if it is a death trap."

According to Dillon, however, the law is not going to leave any "little old lady" who can't make her mortgage payments without the help of a tenant out on the street. Prosecutorial discretion, said the DA, allows him to go after the worst offenders with multiple tenants.

"We are not going after people whose activity does not impact in a way that is harmful to the community. But there are people breaking these laws whose activities do impact in a way that is harmful to the quality of life in a community. Harmful in a sense where their children are going to public schools and nobody is paying taxes to handle the extra influx of that extra kid or increased garbage pick up and increased police activity," said Dillon. "This is going to produce squalor and squalor produces more crime so it has to be impacted or else Nassau County will be heading in a direction where people are not going to want to live here anymore."

121 Chester Street, Long Beach

25 Hudson Street, Long Beach

335 Princeton Street, Westbury

60 Penn Street, Long Beach

59 Farmers Avenue, Plainview

54 Roquette Avenue, Elmont

327 Appeal Avenue, Elmont

327 Linden Place, Westbury

16 Doris Avenue, Franklin Square

172 Caroline Avenue, Garden City South

2389 Post Street, East Meadow

85 Alters Boulevard, Roosevelt

224 Swalm Street, Westbury

195 Kinkel Street, Westbury

166 New York Avenue, Westbury

226 New York Avenue, Westbury