Seniors reduce property tax payments while helping provide city services

LYNN – When she filled out an application seeking a property tax reduction, Karen Gibson never thought she would learn how to make jewelry and be exposed to a host of new books.Those opportunities and others are prompting Gibson, a local resident with a career as an executive assistant and a degree from Salem State College, to work through the year’s end at the North Common Street library where Circulation Supervisor Eileen Kearney praised Gibson as a welcome, if temporary, source of help during a season when full-time library workers take vacations.”She’s so organized,” said Kearney.Thirty local residents over the age of 60, including Gibson, applied at summer’s start to earn up to $600 working in city offices. Although they earn roughly $8 an hour for up to 75 hours worth of work, the seniors’ salaries are paid in the form of reductions to their property tax payments.Mayor Judith Flanagan Kennedy proposed the discount work program, according to her chief of staff Jamie Cerulli, at the start of the year and the City Council approved the tax “work off” plan in the spring.City officials were prepared to offer 60 temporary jobs to taxpayers who met the minimum age and income requirement to apply for the program. Cerulli said 30 seniors applied and many of them, including Gibson, started work in early July.”This is the first year, but now that the word’s out, there will be more interest next year,” Cerulli said.Gibson said her library job will reduce her tax bill and give her a chance to help the library provide services to local residents.She spent Thursday enrolling adults in the library’s summer book club weekly restaurant raffle. She has helped answer questions posed by library users and assisted library program organizers.”Each day I come in, I’m happy to see what I’m going to be doing,” she said.With 16 full-time employees overseeing the main library and its collections, reference, circulation, young adults and childrens sections, Kearney said the library benefits from the temporary help.”It alleviates the workload,” she said.Kearney said senior workers are helping library employees conduct a long-overdue inventory and they will assist students in picking out reading assignments once the start of school looms.Cerulli said senior workers are also temporarily employed in the Grand Army of the Republic building, City Hall Veterans Services office, the City Hall information desk, Veterans Memorial Auditorium where they work as ushers, and with Greater Lynn Senior Services.The senior work off program’s $600 earnings limit allows seniors to reduce their tax bills without having to file a tax return. Cerulli said background checks were performed on all workers and applications for the 2014 work season will be available in January.She anticipates 50 to 70 jobs will be available and a jobs lottery will be held if interest in the jobs exceeds the number of available city positions.