Taxpayers in some local communities will be relearning a painful lesson this year:

Sometimes a property tax-rate decrease means a higher tax bill.

Credit the aptly named "stealth tax."

The stealth tax is called many things, some of them not nearly as polite. But in essence

it's a backdoor tax attached to revaluations that provide public officials a way to give the

impression tax bills are going down when in fact only the tax rate is. The lower rate can

easily be offset by a rise in a property owner's assessment.

Residents of the Lancaster School District and Williamsville are becoming acquainted with

the concept this year.

Lancaster property owners first learned of a possible 22 percent school tax hike, only to

be told later that taxes actually were decreasing. But taxes are not necessarily decreasing or

going up 22 percent.

"That's a reality that every school district and government is employing," said downsizing

advocate Kevin Gaughan. "They resort to hidden taxes to fill big holes."

"It's all spin right now," said Lee Chowaniec, a taxpayer watchdog in Lancaster.

"I don't think anyone believes taxes will go down," said Lancaster Mayor William Cansdale

as trustees try to avoid a tax-rate hike in the village's 2010-11 budget — but know even that

will increase tax bills where assessments have risen.

"We thought we were doing pretty good, and then some guy said, 'Can't you do better?'"

said Cansdale, whose own assessment rose 10 percent and, much to his surprise, caused his

estimated school tax bill to rise.

"I think you need a healthy dose of skepticism," he said.

The stealth tax is not new in Western New York.

Former Amherst Supervisor Susan Grelick was criticized by her political opponents for

issuing sunny statements about minuscule tax-rate increases while ignoring the tax levy, the

total amount of tax money a municipality will collect. One year, when the tax rate was set to go up by less than 1 percent, the tax levy was projected to increase by almost 11 percent.

Officials in Buffalo, Orchard Park and Clarence have heard the same criticism in past

years.

At last week's Williamsville Village Board meeting, trustees focused on a 2.7 percent drop

in the tax rate for the proposed $3.16 million budget but barely touched on a dramatic rise in

Amherst property assessments that means some tax bills will be higher.

Nor did they highlight the 9.3 percent jump in the tax levy.

For both the Village of Williamsville and Lancaster schools, the stakes are high.

Any talk of tax increases is bad news for Williamsville, which is one of the first on

Gaughan's hit list as he campaigns to dissolve villages, which he says are a waste of tax

dollars.

He said the increase in the village's tax levy is the number that matters. "It's the true

cost of what the government is going to take from you," he said. "When [village trustees] put

together their budget, they never seem to consider what the impact will be on their taxpayers'

own budgets. It has no meaning to them."

But Mayor Mary Lowther said neither assessments nor the tax rate had increased in the last

two years, meaning village tax bills didn't rise.

"I don't think it's outrageous," she said of the proposed tax levy hike. "It's very

responsible and fair. People do pay a little more to live in the village, but that's because of the level of services we provide."

For Lancaster, it's all about the May 18 school budget vote. Faced with a $4 million loss

in state aid and millions more for rising fixed costs, mostly for payroll, the district at one

point pondered a record 22 percent increase in the tax levy.

But officials began cutting. In the $85.84 million budget approved by the School Board last

week, the tax levy is projected to go up 5.8 percent.

The estimated tax rate, meanwhile, would decrease. It would be $14.51 per $1,000 of

assessed valuation in Lancaster, down $1.42, or 8.9 percent; $23.41 in Cheektowaga, down 22

cents, or just under 1 percent; and $300.86 in Elma, down $2.90, or just under 1 percent.

The rate decrease is due to the townwide reassessment and new construction in

Lancaster,Superintendent Edward Myszka said.

The district has created a site on its Web page where

residents can calculate their proposed school tax.

Town Assessor Dave C. Marrano has not released information on how many taxpayers in

Lancaster can expect to see assessments rise, decrease or stay the same. When a Buffalo News

reporter requested such a breakdown, he said that The News first had to contact the town

attorney and that he would divulge the information only in a face-to-face meeting.

Then he hung up.

At any rate, Chowaniec said the district's calculator shows what Cansdale learned: Tax

bills start rising when assessments increase about 10 percent, a fairly minor increase, he

noted.

"There are going to be some very unhappy people out there," Chowaniec said.

In hopes of making Lancaster's school budget palatable to a financially hard-pressed and

tax-weary public, board members approved a long list of cuts, including closing the Central

Avenue Elementary School and cutting 32 staff members for a savings of $1.3 million.

They also dug deep into reserve funds, managing to keep the high school's ninth period,

devoted mostly to electives.

If the public defeats the budget, Myszka has said the district will not be able to keep the

ninth period, which is extremely popular with students and their parents, who say those

courses help students gain entrance to college.

District officials also created a community task force, which it first asked to bring the

district ideas for cuts and which is now expected to beat the drum for a "yes" vote on the

budget.

But the district is still extremely nervous, and with good reason. As Myszka notes, the

community has a history of rejecting school budgets whenever it has been through a reval.

Chowaniec said that despite the hard work the district did to cut spending and taxes, this

budget will still be a tough one to get past voters. "They've been spending out of control for

years," he said. "It has finally caught up with them."