N.Y. Real Property Law § 334-a: Filing of subdivision maps in Nassau county; penalty for non-filing

§ 334-a. Filing of subdivision maps in Nassau county; penalty for

non-filing. 1. It shall be the duty of every person or corporation,

excepting church cemetery corporations attached to a religious parish

within the county of Nassau, who, as owner or agent of real property

situated in the county of Nassau, subdivides the same into lots, plots,

blocks, sites, or units with or without streets, for the purpose of

offering such lots, plots, blocks, sites, or units for sale to the

public, regardless of whether they are offered or conveyed by lot, plot

or block designations, units (including shares in a cooperative

corporation), or by metes and bounds, prior to the offering of such

lots, plots, blocks, sites or units for sale, to file or cause to be

filed in the office of the clerk of Nassau county a map or maps of such

real property, subject to the following exceptions:

(a) where real property is subdivided into not more than four lots,

plots, blocks, sites or units that conform to the applicable planning

and zoning regulations or ordinances of the city, town or village, as

the case may be, and such subdivision does not involve the laying out of

a street or the extension of a previously laid out street, the owner or

agent may make written application to the planning commission or

planning authorities having jurisdiction for a waiver of the filing

requirements hereunder upon forms supplied by the appropriate planning

commission. Such a waiver may be granted by such planning commission or

planning authorities after determining that such subdivision plat is in

compliance with this section and with the zoning and planning

regulations of the city, town or village, as the case may be, in which

the property is located. The request for a waiver shall be acted upon

without a public hearing within fifteen days after the filing of the

application unless such period shall have been extended by consent of

the applicant. Where real property is capable of being subdivided into

more than four lots, plots, blocks, sites or units that conform to the

applicable planning and zoning regulations or ordinances of the city,

town or village, as the case may be, and such subdivision does not

involve the laying out of a street or the extension of a previously laid

out street, the planning commission or planning authorities having

jurisdiction may, in the sole discretion of such planning commission or

planning authorities deny such waiver application and require the filing

in the office of the clerk of Nassau county a map or maps of such real

property, subject to appropriate conditions as in the judgment of such

planning commission or planning authorities as are requisite in the

interest of the public health, safety and general welfare; or

(b) where a subdivision map has been filed prior to January twelfth,

nineteen hundred forty-five, and alterations made thereon do not involve

any change, or extensions of previously laid out streets and where the

only alterations are changes in lot boundaries which are made solely for

the purpose of adhering to applicable zoning regulations, it shall not

be necessary to file such altered map or obtain a waiver therefor; or

(c) where there is a conversion of an existing structure into units,

which structure: (1) was in existence and legally occupied prior to

August fifth, nineteen hundred eighty-seven; and (2) where title to said

units is to be held in a condominium, cooperative or mixed form of

ownership; and (3) the use thereof is in compliance with the zoning and

planning regulations of the city, town or village, as the case may be,

in which the structure is located.

As used in this section, the term "units" shall include space used or

to be used for either residential, commercial, mixed or other use

whether title is held in fee simple, a condominium, cooperative, or

mixed form of ownership. It shall be unlawful, after a map or maps of

such property has been filed, to subdivide said property in a manner

other than as shown on said map unless said map has been amended and

approved in accordance with the provisions of subdivision six of this

section.

2. Such map or maps must be thirty-six inches by forty-eight inches or

less in size, drawn with pen and ink upon tracing cloth or printed on

mylar upon a scale of not more than one hundred feet to the inch and

oriented with the north point at the top of the map. At no time shall

the north point vary more than twenty degrees east or west of the

perpendicular border.

3. In case the lands sought to be shown upon the map are too extensive

to be shown upon a map thirty-six inches by forty-eight inches in size,

then a key map thirty-six inches by forty-eight inches in size, drawn

upon a reduced scale, but without detail, showing the entire quantity of

land, subdivided into units embracing the entire map, shall be made and

filed, and each subdivision or unit shall be shown upon a separate map.

4. Said map shall set forth the courses, measurements and adjoining

property owners with sufficient definiteness to determine the location

of said property, and upon each map shall appear the name of the record

owner and the name of the subdivision as stated by the owner and said

name shall be approved by the county clerk as a name not so similar to

the name appearing upon any filed subdivision map as to deceive or

mislead the public as to the identity of such subdivision.

5. Upon each and every of said maps shall appear the name or names of

the town or towns, city or cities, incorporated village or incorporated

villages in which said lands are located wholly or in part, and endorsed

thereon shall be a certificate of the licensed land surveyor who made or

caused the said map to be made, certifying that the map or maps were

made from an actual survey of the property that was performed by or

under the direction of said licensed land surveyor and the date of the

completion of the survey. Said certificate shall state that stone or

concrete monuments have been set at not less than two corners of every

street intersection as indicated on such map or maps and that the lands

shown thereon have been monumented in a manner to indicate the distance

from the nearest established street, avenue, road or highway, provided,

however, that where the planning board or other governmental agency

having jurisdiction over the approval of said maps has required the

subdivider to deposit with the town or local governing body a

performance bond or bonds to secure the installation and completion of

all site improvements, including setting stone or concrete monuments in

the streets as aforesaid, and simultaneously with the filing of said map

the subdivider files with the county clerk a written certification from

the town or local governing body that such bond or bonds have been duly

deposited and accepted by the town or local governing body and that said

bond or bonds expressly include the setting of stone or concrete

monuments as aforesaid, the said surveyor's certificate may state that

stone or concrete monuments will be set at not less than two corners of

every street intersection as indicated on such map upon completion of

the installation of said streets and that the surveyor shall execute and

deliver a further written certification of the completion of such

monumentation to both the county clerk and the town or local governing

body prior to and as a condition for the release of said performance

bond or bonds.

6. Before such filing each and every of said maps shall be approved by

the planning commission or planning commissions having jurisdiction in

the area embraced within said maps in accordance with the regulations of

such planning commission or planning commissions and the approval of

such planning commission or planning commissions shall be endorsed

thereon.

6-a. Before such filing each and every of said maps shall have

endorsed thereon the consent to such filing of the mortgagees of such

real property.

7. The planning commission or planning authorities having jurisdiction

shall not approve any such map until the commissioner of public works of

Nassau county has endorsed thereon a statement that he has approved

plans for grades of the streets, avenues, roads or highways shown on

such map, and the drainage thereof. The commissioner of public works may

require that separate and distinct plans for the grading and drainage be

prepared. Such plans shall show sufficient data to enable the

commissioner of public works to determine the adequacy thereof. He may

require any changes in grades or plans which he deems necessary to make

such grades or plans conform with any general or comprehensive plan

adopted for the county, or to serve the best interests of the county as

a whole. Upon his approval of plans for the grades and drainage for the

streets, avenues, roads or highways shown on said map he shall endorse

such approval on the plans submitted to him, or as they shall have been

revised, and shall file same in his office, and shall file a print

thereof in the office of each planning authority having jurisdiction. He

shall further endorse on the map submitted to the planning authority for

approval a statement that he has approved grades and drainage for the

streets, avenues, roads or highways shown thereon, in accordance with

detailed plans on file in his office.

8. At the time of filing such map with the county clerk an abstract of

title and tax search of all of the property shown on said map together

with a certificate of title, certifying to the county of Nassau the name

or names of the owner or owners of said property together with all liens

thereon, shall be delivered to the county clerk and filed in his office.

Such abstract and search shall cover a period of not less than the

twenty years immediately preceding the date of the certificate and such

certificate shall be made by a title company duly incorporated and

authorized to transact business in the state of New York or a person

duly authorized to certify titles under the laws of the state of New

York. In the event the title to said property has been duly registered

pursuant to the provisions of the real property law for the registration

of titles to real property, that fact shall be set forth upon the

original map together with the number of the certificate of the title so

registered and an index of such abstracts and registrations made to

clearly indicate the maps to which they refer and the abstract of title

and certificate of title above referred to shall not be required. In the

case of a tax title, the fee title for a period of at least twenty years

prior to the date of the tax sale under which tax title is claimed must

be submitted as a part of the abstract.

9. Every such map, whether intended as an original subdivision or as

an alteration of a prior subdivision in such county, shall have endorsed

thereon at the time such map is offered to be filed the certificates of

the county treasurer and the receiver of taxes of each town and city and

the tax collecting officer of each incorporated village within which any

part of the tract of land shown on said map or maps is located, or of a

title company authorized to transact business in the state of New York

stating that all taxes and assessments which are liens prior to the time

such original or subsequent map is offered to be filed, whether assessed

against the entire tract of land or against any lot or other part of

said land, shown on the tax search required to be filed with the county

clerk, have been paid.

10. At the time of the filing of such map there shall also be

furnished to the county clerk a copy of such map, prepared upon tracing

cloth by such process as he shall prescribe, which shall be duly

certified by him to be a true copy of the original and which shall be

forwarded by him to the board of assessors of the county.

11. The clerk of the county of Nassau upon receiving such maps shall

file them by some suitable method in consecutive order and they shall be

consecutively numbered in the order of filing and indexed under the

initial letters of all substantives in the titles.

12. The fee of the county clerk for receiving and filing each of said

separate maps or sheets and indexing the same shall be five dollars, and

an additional fee for every block created, which fee shall be the same

as the additional fee provided for block indexing by the Nassau county

administrative code.

13. Failure to file said map or maps as required by the provisions of

this section, shall subject the owner of such lands shown upon such

maps, or of unsold lots, plots or units thereon, to a penalty to the

people of the state of New York of five hundred dollars for each and

every lot, plot or unit thereon subdivided, sold or conveyed by or for

such owner prior to the due filing of such map or maps.

14. Whenever at least two years have elapsed since the filing of a map

of the subdivision of any tract of land into lots, plots, blocks or

sites, with or without opened or proposed roads, the owner of such

tract, or of any part thereof having an area equivalent to that of any

two or more contiguous lots or an area of not less than one-half acre,

may abandon and cancel the subdivision of the property so owned by

recording in the office of the county clerk a written certificate of

abandonment, duly executed and acknowledged, which shall contain a

description of the property to be abandoned, the complete title or name

of the map, the filing date and file number thereof, except that no

opened or proposed streets, other than those entirely within the bounds

of the property to be abandoned, or the area within such bounds of

streets which as laid out on said map come to a dead-end within such

bounds, shall be abandoned unless each owner of a lot or interest in the

subdivision consents to the abandonment thereof by instrument in writing

duly executed, acknowledged and recorded with the certificate of

abandonment; provided, however, that whenever at least twenty years have

elapsed since the filing of said map, the owner of the property to be

abandoned may, without such consent, abandon any streets or portions

thereof shown on said map and which are within the bounds of the

property to be abandoned if such streets or portions thereof are neither

opened, nor public highways, nor used by the public, nor necessary for

the use of owners, occupants or any other persons having an interest in

any part of the subdivision; but nothing herein shall prevent an owner

using or a seller of land from conveying part of a lot, plot or site

separately or together with an adjoining lot, plot or site, subject to

the provisions of local zoning ordinances. Whenever there is on file

more than one map of the property to be abandoned, such property must be

abandoned in the manner herein provided as to each of such maps. A copy

of each certificate of abandonment must be filed with the assessor

and/or board of assessors of each town and village wherein any portion

of the property to be abandoned is situated, and the endorsement of

approval by each such assessor and/or board of assessors must be

endorsed on the original of each certificate presented to the county

clerk for recording. An abstract of title to the property to be

abandoned covering a period of at least twenty years last past, and a

certificate of the county treasurer of Nassau county to the effect that

there are no unpaid tax liens against such property, must be submitted

to the county clerk and be approved by him at the time the certificate

of abandonment and cancellation is offered for recording. Said

certificates and abstracts shall be filed in the county clerk's office,

a suitable index shall be kept of the same, and notice thereof shall be

endorsed by the recording officer upon the map therein referred to at

the time of recording the certificate of abandonment. Where the

endorsement of approval of the town or village assessor above referred

to includes a recitation to the effect that the municipality has duly

adopted an urban renewal plan pursuant to article fifteen of the general

municipal law which plan provides for adequate street access to all

properties within and adjacent to the planning area, and further that

the property to be abandoned is subject to said plan, and its

abandonment is required thereunder, the clerk shall accept and record

the certificate of abandonment tendered therefor regardless of the area

thereof, and notwithstanding that the property to be abandoned is a

portion of an opened or proposed street for which the consent to the

abandonment thereof required in this subdivision has not been obtained.

Upon the abandonment of subdivided property as herein provided such

property shall, for all purposes, be regarded as a single tract of land.

No abandonment of lot divisions shall be made under this section for the

purpose of reviving or making effective any other subdivision of the

same tract of land and no map may be reinstated as it was prior to the

filing of any abandonment certificate. The fee of the county clerk for

such filing and indexing each certificate and abstract therewith shall

be ten dollars and shall be paid by the party presenting them for

filing. Provided, however, that the Nassau county board of supervisors

shall have full authority to abandon any subdivision of property or any

portion thereof which the county of Nassau now owns or may hereafter

acquire through the sale of tax liens, by causing to be filed with the

county clerk of Nassau county, a certificate of abandonment, duly

executed by the said county board, without regard to any of the other

foregoing requirements of this section. Nothing contained in this

section shall be construed to prevent the filing of a new map and

certificate of a subdivision of real property in the manner prescribed

herein, after, and in the area of, a subdivision or portion thereof

abandoned in accordance with the provisions of this section.