IN RE: Chana TAUB (2025)

Order and judgment (one paper), Supreme Court, New York County (Nancy M. Bannon, J.), entered on or about August 22, 2023, which denied the petition to annul a determination of respondents New York City Water Board and New York City Department of Environmental Protection, dated September 30, 2014, denying petitioner's request for a recalculation of her water bill, granted respondents’ cross-motion to dismiss the petition, and dismissed the proceeding brought pursuant to CPLR article 78, unanimously affirmed, without costs.

The court properly dismissed the petition as untimely.  The Water Board issued a final determination on September 30, 2014, when it denied petitioner's appeal.  Petitioner commenced this proceeding on December 20, 2022, well outside the four-month statute of limitations (CPLR 217[1]).  Contrary to petitioner's contention, an August 31, 2022 letter in which DEP responded to petitioner's request for reconsideration did not restart the limitations period because the letter “merely referenced [the] original denial” and rendered “no new determination to be challenged [in] an article 78 proceeding” (Matter of Eldaghar v. New York City Hous. Auth., 34 A.D.3d 326, 327, 824 N.Y.S.2d 268 [1st Dept. 2006], lv denied 8 N.Y.3d 804, 831 N.Y.S.2d 106, 863 N.E.2d 111 [2007]).

A 2015 DEP inspector's report suggesting that petitioner's water meter was faulty is not grounds to equitably toll the statute of limitations.  Petitioner had knowledge of the report by May 2017 but did not commence this proceeding until more than five years later.

We have considered petitioner's remaining contentions and find them unavailing.