Real LI

Study: Apartments don't overburden LI schools

1:58 PM By Ellen Yan

Apartments and other high-density developments don’t bring more school-age children per unit than traditional single-family homes, according to a study that was commissioned by the Long Housing Partnership and done by the Long Island Association, a business advocacy group.

In the Nassau multifamily complexes examined, 10,926 dwellings generated 1,770 school-age children, or a ratio of .16 child per unit -- lower than the .53 ratio for all the county's occupied residential abodes last year, found the report's author, Pearl Kamer, head of PMKB Consulting Associates, which has done work for some major, proposed developments, including Charles Wang's Lighthouse project in Uniondale. Kamer is also chief economist at the Long Island Association, a business advocacy group.

In Suffolk, 16,668 dwelling units generated 3,049 school kids, a .18 ratio that's higher than the .58 ratio for all the county's occupied homes last year, researchers said.

The analysis was unveiled Monday at the Partnership’s annual symposium.

It’s aimed at debunking the “myth” that multifamily developments, from town homes to apartments, exacerbate crowding and financial woes in the school districts. Fears of higher school taxes have several times crushed proposals for high-density developments on Long Island.

But the child-per-unit measure does not take into account that the total number of school-age children in a multifamily complex could be higher than the total from all the single or two-family homes that the same property can accommodate.

In many public meetings over the years, residents have complained the multifamily developments would flood already-burdened school districts with more children and would generate less in taxes than they use.

A Partnership official referred questions to Kamer.

In an e-mailed response over the weekend, Kamer said she used the measure because the Partnership asked her to look at the number of children per unit and determine whether such developments contributed more in taxes than they used.

“These questions were asked because of the pervasive belief, particularly among school districts, that multifamily housing complexes generate more school-age children per dwelling unit than single-family homes and that multifamily developments do not pay enough in school taxes to offset the cost of the children they generate,” Kamer wrote.

“The focus in this type of research has always been on dwelling units, rather than on other measures, including acreage, because our property tax structure is geared to the market value of a dwelling unit, whether it is a condo, coop, rental unit or owner-occupied single-family home.”

Housing advocates and planners say Long Island's housing stock, primarily single-family homes, has increasingly failed to meet residents’ needs, as baby boomers become empty nesters and the younger generation leaves for places with more affordable quarters.

The study, which both counties’ planning departments worked on also, looked at 140 Nassau complexes and 159 Suffolk ones. Only the units with usable data were covered in the study. Age-restricted complexes were excluded from the calculations.

The research broke the data into various factors -- location, type of housing, number of units, property taxes, education cost per student and more -- to see if the development generated more tax revenue or led to higher taxes.