ALBANY – New York’s tax cap limits the growth in property taxes to 2 percent a year or the rate of inflation, whichever is lower.

So next year, because of low inflation, the tax cap could be at or near a zero percent increase, school officials are warning.

The Educational Conference Board said in a statement that based on current economic trends, the cap next year might cause schools to keep taxes flat. The only way to override the cap would be to seek a supermajority — which requires 60 percent approval at the polls.

“Over and over again, voters are told that New York state has a 2 percent tax cap. We do not,” said John Yagielski, who heads the group, in a statement. “Given current trends, the starting point for the tax cap will be zero percent – no increase in local revenue for schools without a 60 percent override approved by voters.”

Based on the first four months of Consumer Price Index data and projections by the state Division of Budget, the cap could have a baseline increase of zero percent, the group warned. The group includes a variety of education advocacy organizations.

While the cap has exemptions — such as capital costs and the growth in pension costs above 2 percentage points — schools would be further limited with lower inflation rates through the cap, which Gov. Andrew Cuomo has hailed since he installed it in 2011 with approval from the state Legislature.

The cap limit for the school year that starts July 1 is 1.62 percent.

Cuomo is pressing for the cap to be extended or made permanent before the legislation session ends June 17. It expires next year. It has cut the growth in property taxes to about half of what it had been before it was installed in 2011. The growth in taxes have been about 2 percent since the cap.

“It changed norms and behaviors in the state,” Cuomo said Wednesday in Nyack, Rockland County, about the tax cap. “And it is working better than anyone could have imagined.”

But schools are looking for reforms to the program, including no longer tying the cap to the rate of inflation. Another change they are seeking is to no longer require a 60 percent vote to override the cap.

The 60 percent override is particularly challenging for schools, which need voter approval for their budget each May. For local governments, they need 60 percent of their governing boards to override the cap — a much easier chore.

It’s difficult to get voters to override the cap. Of the nine school budgets that failed in New York last month, seven were in districts that sought to override the cap.

The extension of the cap may be tied to extending rent-control laws in New York City — which expire this month.

“We now have four years’ worth of experience with the tax cap and we have seen many anomalies. Any talk of extending the tax cap beyond the current sunset must include a discussion of the ways to fix it,” Timothy Kremer, executive director of the state School Boards Association, said in a statement.

Still, business groups and many lawmakers, particularly Republicans, are pressing for the cap to be kept as is.

E.J. McMahon, president of the Empire Center for New York Policy, said if the cap limit drops to less than 1 percent, so be it. Taxes should be kept the rate of inflation, he said.

“The principle behind the cap is to keep taxes in line with the cost of living,” McMahon said. “If the cost of living increase is zero, then it’s fully justifiable to have a cap of zero.”

© 2015 Gannett News Service