NYC official received Florida homestead tax break while living in New York

Carole Post, New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg’s Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications commissioner, has been benefiting from a property-tax exemption for Florida residents for the past four years, despite working full-time in New York for the Bloomberg administration, the Post reported. Post, who earns $205,180 per year, and her husband, Lawrence, have saved $3,000 in taxes since 2005 on their multimillion-dollar home in West Palm Beach, according to public records. At that time, each of the Posts said in paperwork that they qualified for a homestead exemption on the mansion, which is granted only to full-time Florida residents, according to the Palm Beach County Property Appraiser’s Office. Carole Post moved to the New York City in 2001, and never responded to annual request from the appraiser’s office for any changes of address. After an inquiry from a reporter yesterday, Lawrence Post, who is still claiming the Florida home as his permanent residence, contacted the appraiser’s office to alert the state of his wife’s move to New York. The couple will continue to receive the tax exemption because Lawrence primarily lives in Florida, said the city’s Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications. A biography of Carole Post on the technology and telecommunications Web site says that she lives on Manhattan’s Upper West Side with her husband. [Post]