Board cuts 318 Pine Creek assessment to $1.8 million after heated debate over waterfront coding

By a 3–2 vote on March 12, the Board of Assessment Appeals reduced the assessed value of 318 Pine Creek Avenue (appellants Wendy and Edwin Levine) to $1,800,000 from the town’s stated valuation of $2,370,400.

The decision followed more than an hour of discussion about how waterfront parcels along Pine Creek should be coded for land-value purposes and whether the town assessor should have added comparative sales to the appeal file after completing the original valuation. Board members debated multiple proposed reductions before settling on the $1.8 million figure.

Why it matters: the property sits on a creek with partial water access and a secondary cottage; small differences in parcel coding multiply into large changes in land valuation, producing six-figure shifts in overall assessed value. Appellants argued their land was overvalued relative to nearby lots with similar or better…