This case presents two novel issues regarding real estate taxation of commercial waterfront property. Specifically, are the riparian rights attached to such property as augmented by a submerged land license that authorizes offshore marina and dockage operations taxable under any circumstances? If so, are they taxable under the circumstances of this case where such rights were assigned by the upland owners to a corporate entity and the dockage is not permanently affixed to either the upland or any submerged lands?
I. Background
What prompts these inquires is the manner in which the Town of Huron has valued the petitioners’ property for purposes of the annual tax levies by the Town, county, and local school district upon real property within their respective jurisdictions. Of course, a municipality’s ability to generate revenue through this type of taxation must be found in and comply with state enabling authority (see Castle Oil Corp. v City of New York,
Generally, under RPTL 305 (2), unless a uniform system of fractional property values is in place, a property’s value for purposes of real property taxation is its “full value.” (See 98 NY Jur 2d, Taxation and Assessment § 303.) This term derives from article XVI, § 2 of the State Constitution requiring that “[assessments shall in no case exceed full value” and is repeated in RPTL 701 (4) (a) defining “excessive” as “an entry on an assessment role of the assessed valuation of real property which exceeds the full value of real property.” By settled judicial construction, the term “value” means “market value” (see Foss v City of Rochester,
This simpliciter stages the issues raised at this juncture of the tax certiorari brought by petitioners. Before one can intelligently discuss market value and the appropriate methodologies to establish that value in a particular case, one must understand the object of the valuation. Petitioners claim that respondents have failed in this regard, resulting in an excessive valuation.
The facts upon which petitioners make this claim are straightforward and largely undisputed. The parcel at issue designated by respondents as tax account parcel No. 72117-00-890891 consists of approximately five acres of land known as 6483 Catchpole Road located in the Town of Huron, Wayne County. This parcel was conveyed to petitioners by deeds dated September 18, 1990, and recorded September 20, 1990, in the Wayne County Clerk’s Office at liber 851 at pages 818 and 820.
The parcel adjoins Great Sodus Bay and benefits from substantial waterfront. The petitioners developed the parcel commercially to where it now hosts a restaurant named Cutter’s Restaurant and a marina named Oak Park Marina. The restaurant and marina are separate operating entities, the latter by a corporation known as Oak Park Marina, Inc. (the corporation), also owned by petitioners. The marina operations use substantial upland improvements on the parcel, including buildings devoted to boat maintenance, repair, storage, and launching, as well as facilities for retail sales of fuel and boating accessories. The marina operations also include a dockage facility extending into Sodus Bay. This dockage facility consists of four main piers extending from the shoreline, the most southerly two being 420 feet long and the northerly two being 300 feet long. The piers are 100 feet distant from each other at the shoreline and as extended into the bay. Affixed to the end of each of these main piers are perpendicular pier extensions that form a “T” configuration. Three of the pier extensions creating the top of the “T” are 90 feet long, and the fourth attached to
The piers and docks are supported by flotation material incorporated into the construction, secured in location by apparatus anchored in the bay. The piers and docks are installed and removed on a seasonable basis to allow for the freezing of Sodus Bay during the winter and the' consequent damage that would be caused if the dockage was left to the mercy of the expanding, shifting, and heaving ice. The docks are attached to the shore at a breakwall from which electrical service extends for convenience of the boaters. When installed, the dockage is used primarily for seasonal slip rentals with some space left available for transient boaters.
II. Nature of Property Interest Being Assessed
The dockage facility has not gone unnoticed by the town assessors. In 1998, the assessors undertook a comprehensive reassessment of petitioners’ parcel. With the aid of recommended assessment methodology and computations provided by the New York State Office of Real Property Services, the Town arrived at a total assessment by first establishing the market value of the dockage facility to be the equal of the ostensible number of rental slips (250) times the market value of $3,300 per slip, for a total of $825,000. The Town claims that the market value per slip was extrapolated from reported statewide and regional marina sales data, substantially discounted in petitioners’ favor and much less than an income approach would warrant in this case, a value of $1,477,700 using the estimated figures and methodology employed by the State in its field valuation of the marina. The “extremely conservative” valuation of $825,000 was assigned as the land value of the four acres of the five-acre parcel that were devoted to commercial use and to which the docks are attached. The remaining one acre of nonwaterfront land improved by a private residence was assigned a separate value of $93,750.
Petitioners instituted this tax certiorari proceeding contesting the parcel’s assessed valuation as appearing on the 2004 tax roll on several grounds, principally consisting of claims of illegal and erroneous valuation, and one of overvaluation, all of which relate to inclusion of the docks into total aggregate valuation. Petitioners have moved for certain declaratory relief at this early stage of the proceedings prior to discovery and appraisal exchange. At the outset, petitioners claim that the dockage does not constitute assessable property; as such, the Town erred as a matter of law in valuating the dockage and assigning that value as the commercial upland value. This claim has novel aspects to it not explored in reported decisional law.
Analysis must start, of course, with the statutory directive regarding what is or is not assessable property. RPTL 300 states that “[a] 11 real property within the state shall be subject to real property taxation . . . unless exempt therefrom by law.” RPTL 102 (12) (a) and (b) in relevant part define “real property” to mean the “land itself,” together with “[b]uildings and other articles and structures, substructures and superstructures erected upon, under[,] or above the land, or affixed thereto, including bridges and wharves and piers.” In determining what fits within this statutory definition of real property, courts are guided by “[t]he concepts and refinements which have developed in the classifications of types of property at common law” (Matter of Consolidated Edison Co. of N.Y. v City of New York,
At common law, what gives the concept of real property substance, and creates value, are the incidents of ownership collected under the familiar “bundle of rights” metaphor. The most important of these rights is that of possession and use. As stated by Blackstone:
“Land hath also, in its legal signification, an indefinite extent, upwards as well as downwards. Cujus est solum, ejus est usque ad coelum, is the maxim of*478 the law, upwards; therefore no man may erect any building, or the like, to overhang another’s land: and downwards, whatever is in a direct line, between the surface of any land, and the centre of the earth, belongs to the owner of the surface ... So that the word ‘land’ includes not only the face of the earth, but everything under it, or over it” (2 Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England, at 18).
This concept of land was similarly understood by Chancellor Kent, who recognized in this country adoption of the English doctrine of corporeal hereditaments pertaining to certain rights incident to land ownership, including dominion not only over
“the ground or soil, but every thing which is attached to the earth, whether by the course of nature, as trees, herbage, and water, or by the hand of man, as houses and other buildings; and which has an indefinite extent, upwards as well as downwards, so as to include every thing terrestrial, under it or over it” (3 James Kent, Commentaries on American Law, at 321 [1st ed 1828]).
The three dimensional concept of real property created by upward and downward projections from lines demarking surface ownership challenges any attempt to include within its purview rights in space or objects outside those projections on, over, or under lands owned by another. This is the case here. The two deeds to the petitioners’ property describe its waterfront boundary either as the “high water line of Great Sodus Bay” or the “shoreline.” The deed descriptions respect the fact that beyond the shoreline, the State of New York holds title to the submerged lands (see Stevenson, Title of Land Under Water in New York, 23 Yale LJ 397 [1914]).
The court takes judicial notice of the fact that Sodus Bay is a body of navigable water. It is well settled that an upland owner has the riparian right of free ingress to and egress from abutting navigable water, including the right to install dockage for such purpose (see Matter of Haher’s Sodus Point Bait Shop v Wigle,
Of course, the dockage at issue in this case extending 420 feet into the waters of Sodus Bay goes well beyond the scope of petitioners’ common-law riparian rights. However, petitioners acquired the right to install and maintain the dockage under Public Lands Law § 75. This law permits the State Commissioner of General Services to grant rights to state-owned lands under navigable water to private individuals or entities subject to statutory limitations as well as restrictions the Commissioner may impose as appropriate in particular cases. As relevant to the instant case, the statutory limitations are significant. First, any grant must be consistent with the public interest in protecting and preserving the availability of navigable waters for public use and due regard for the legitimate interests of neighboring private property owners (see Public Lands Law § 75).
Petitioners, acting through a wholly-owned corporation, applied to the Commissioner of General Services and were granted the right to install the dockage subject to this proceeding. That right was memorialized in a written submerged land license commencing November 2, 2002, and running for a 10-year term. The license requires payment of an annual fee and adherence to the dockage plan submitted. The license requires that the grantee be responsible for payment of any local real property taxes that may result from the license. The latter provision reflects the fact that, while the state-owned submerged lands are exempt from taxation, the property that may become attached to the land pursuant the license may constitute separate and taxable “real property” for purposes of local taxation.
The theory of assessment used by the Town in this case was not predicated upon the docks constituting separate “real property” because of their use and manner of connection to the leased submerged lands owned by the State. Rather, as succinctly stated by the town attorney, the assessors valued the petitioners’ property “based on the riparian right to locate 250 slips at the property, whether on permanent or temporary docks.” The Town employs a generous concept of riparian entitlement to sustain this position, including not only rights granted under the common law, but also rights granted pursuant to statute to maintain dockage over submerged lands not subject to common-law riparian use.
As noted, riparian rights are regarded as a taxable part of the real property to which they attach and are properly considered
Second, apart from the express statutory language, the court finds that the unique features of a submerged land license issued under Public Lands Law § 75 distinguishes the facts from the typical lease of state property where the leasehold is regarded as personal property and not taxable. In the case of a submerged land license to install dockage, the license enlarges and extends the upland owner’s riparian entitlements. As indicated earlier, the license can only be granted to an upland owner, consistent with the rights of the public and neighboring property owners, and then only for water dependent uses. The license and usage it authorizes is appurtenant to the upland and properly considered as part and parcel of that land for local tax purposes. Accordingly, the Town was authorized to value petitioners’ property based upon consideration of the dockage facility attached thereto.
Petitioners further argue that even if an offshore dockage facility may in some circumstances be considered in valuating the upland parcel to which it is attached, this is not proper under the circumstances of this case, where a separate, albeit wholly-owned, corporation owns and operates the dockage by virtue of a lease agreement with the upland property owners and the dockage is the separate personalty of the corporation. Petitioners fuse two issues: first, is there a real property interest to be assessed, and, if so, how do you value it? Regarding the first issue, once nonexempt property is classified as real property for tax purposes, the real property tax attaches to the combined interests of all parties interested in the property (Matter of Fort Hamilton Manor v Boyland,
The existence of mortgaged or leased interests in real property may be relevant to the second issue of valuation. The relevance would come where the capitalization of income method of valuation is appropriate, and income and expenses largely determine commercial property value. Petitioners argue, in essence, that the Town’s use of this method is one that impermissibly taxes the purported value of its dockage business and not the value of any real property to which it is appurtenant. Petitioners reinforce their argument by noting that the dockage is owned and operated by the corporation separate and apart from the real estate and is not a part thereof. This argu
The court finds that dockage facilities of the type adjacent to petitioners’ property are not specialties in the sense that their value cannot be determined by income capitalization or comparable sales methods of real property valuation. Without gainsaying the intangible economic value of the amenities and management of the marina’s operations in positioning the dockage facility in the competitive market, what is producing income is the rental of space, not unlike spaces in a parking lot or garage for motor vehicles. The actual, or imputed rentals if appropriate, may be the basis of a valuation of petitioners’ real property (see Matter of Myron Hunt/Shaker Loudon Assoc. v Board of Assessment Review for Town of Colonie,
The docks themselves and associated apparatus, apart from the income derived therefrom, certainly have value as tangible property. From the record before the court, it does not appear that the Town has assessed their value as a tangible piece of the real estate, as it did the restaurant, swimming pool, and marina store. Whether the dockage as tangible property bears sufficient physical and functional connection to the real property to qualify as a taxable component of petitioners’ real property does not control, in the court’s analysis, whether the income capitalization value derived from the dockage may be attributed to the upland. Indeed, the court has found that the docks’ status as realty or personal does not control the taxable value coming
The remaining arguments of the parties relating to the validity of the data employed by the Town in reaching the challenged assessment upon petitioners’ property involve issues to be decided at trial after completion of discovery and exchange of appraisal reports.
Accordingly, petitioners’ motion for declaratory relief is denied on the merits to the extent it seeks judgment declaring that the dockage facility appurtenant to petitioners’ land cannot be considered in valuating that land for real property tax purposes. The remaining grounds for petitioners’ motion are denied without prejudice and may be renewed at the time of trial. The cross motion of the respondents for the demanded discovery is granted.
Notes
. This one acre with single-family residence had for several years prior to 1998 been given a separate tax subaccount at the request of the petitioners so they could receive a separate tax bill for what was their parents’ home at the
. “It has often been decided by the Supreme Court of the United States and by the New York Court of Appeals that in this country the fee title of lands under navigable waters up to the high water mark is vested in the commonwealth or state in which the property is situated, or in its grantees. These decisions are based upon the theory that the state or commonwealth is the logical and legal successor in this country of the sovereign or supreme power of Great Britain, which, before the Revolution, resided in the Crown and Parliament, and held, in the name of the King, the title to all public lands, including lands under water.” (Id., citing Illinois Central R. Co. v Illinois,
. But see Board of Trustees of Town of Huntington v W. Wilton Wood, Inc.,
. Public Lands Law § 3 (1) charges the State Commissioner of General Services with the overall care and superintendence of all state lands unless such superintendence is specifically vested in another state agency. Public Lands Law § 8 reposes within the Commissioner the right and obligation to institute proceedings to remedy trespasses upon state lands. Public Lands Law § 75 (7) (b) states in pertinent part:
“No wharf, dock, pier, jetty, platform, breakwater, mooring or other structure shall be constructed, erected, anchored, suspended, placed or substantially replaced, altered, modified, enlarged, or expanded in, on or above state-owned lands underwater, nor shall any fill be placed on such lands underwater, unless a lease, easement, permit, or other interest is obtained from the commissioner, which authorizes the use and occupancy of those state-owned lands underwater to be affected by such act or acts.”
. This is a manifestation of what is known as the public trust doctrine. As stated in 7 Warren’s Weed, New York Real Property, Land Under Water § 77.10 (5th ed):
“Under the public trust doctrine the State holds lands under navigable waters and the foreshore in its sovereign capacity as trustee for the beneficial use and enjoyment of the public. The doctrine grows out of the common law concept of the jus publicum, the public right of navigation and fishery.”
. State-owned real property is exempt from local taxation pursuant to RPTL 404 (1). Property exempt from local taxation under RPTL 404 (1) does not lose its exempt status when it is leased to nongovernmental individuals or entities engaged in private enterprise (see 98 NY Jur 2d, Taxation and Assessment § 120). However, property owned by such lessee attached to such state-owned land is regarded as separate real property and taxable as such if the property falls within the statutory definition of “real property” set forth in RPTL 102 (12), which includes buildings, structures, and other articles, erected upon, above, or under the land, or affixed thereto (98 NY Jur 2d, Taxation and Assessment § 97; see Matter of Fort Hamilton Manor v Boyland, 4 NY2d 192, 198 [1958]).
. Contrast Matter of City of New York v Schwartz,