Saratoga’s property tax rate is the only one below $2 in the state

MOSTLY TRUE — Saratoga’s county tax rate has fallen for two straight years and is well documented as among the lowest in NY, though the exact "only one" ranking could not be independently confirmed.

THE STATEMENT

“Our property tax rate is the only one below $2 in the state.”
Phil Barrett, Chairman, Saratoga County Board of Supervisors — remarks on adoption of the 2026 county budget, Dec. 10, 2025

THE VERDICT: MOSTLY TRUE

Saratoga County’s adopted 2026 budget set the county property tax rate at $1.77 per $1,000 of assessed value, down from $1.87 in 2025 — a roughly 5% cut and the second consecutive year of reduction, confirmed independently by the Daily Gazette and WGY’s coverage of the Dec. 10 Board of Supervisors meeting. That continues a multi-year downward trend: the rate was $2.23 per $1,000 in 2022 and $1.95 in 2024, and in each of those years county officials — Administrator Steve Bulger in 2024, Barrett in 2025 and 2026 — have publicly described Saratoga’s rate as the lowest county tax rate in New York State.

The nonpartisan Empire Center for Public Policy’s “Benchmarking NY” analysis independently notes that Saratoga County “stands out because it has both low spending and a low effective property tax rate” compared with similarly sized counties, which supports the general thrust of the claim. What this review could not independently confirm is the precise superlative — that Saratoga is “the only” county below $2 per $1,000. Checking that would require cross-referencing the state comptroller’s full county-by-county tax rate tables, which was not accessible for a complete verification here; it remains plausible that another high-value county elsewhere in the state also falls under $2.

Given the well-documented downward trend and the consistency with which both county officials and an independent fiscal watchdog describe Saratoga’s county tax rate as exceptionally low, the claim is judged mostly accurate — though the specific “only one” ranking is not independently confirmed with the sources available.

Sources

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