PROVINCETOWN — They’re neighbors. They’re at the local market. They own property, pay taxes and are probably registered to vote somewhere else.

They are the part-time resident taxpayers of the Lower and Outer Cape, and some of them are pushing for more rights here at their second home — Cape Cod.

“I think it’s important to note that we aren’t asking for a cut in our taxes or cut in funding of anything,” said Steve Fossella, the president of the Provincetown Part-Time Resident Taxpayer Association. “We want the town to thrive. We just want to be treated like our neighbors. We want to have a say and want to be treated like any other person that pays taxes.”

The Cape has long been a popular location for seasonal living, with about 41 percent of all the homes on the Cape counted as seasonal, according to a 2017 Cape Cod Commission study. The split in each town is different, but the Outer and Lower Cape have higher percentages of seasonal homes. Truro has the highest, at about 76 percent, and all of the top five seasonal home rates on the Cape are on the Lower and Outer Cape.

In Provincetown, part-time residents fund most of the town’s taxes — by their estimate, about 85 percent — and they want to have more of a say.

In an ideal world, they would be able to vote on financial issues, vote for select board and help set the town’s priorities, said Scott Van Hove, a member of the Provincetown association’s board.

“(The Select Board) just came out with the goals and objectives for fiscal '19 (and) 83 percent of the property owners in this town weren’t involved in those priorities,” he said.

But they don’t see the rules in town changing any time soon.

“Personally, I don’t see a solution locally,” Fossella said. He says for things to change, part-timers will have to go to the state legislature.

Provincetown’s existing charter allows part-time residents to serve as alternates on nonregulatory boards if there aren’t enough registered voters to fill the alternate positions.

A proposed charter amendment would eliminate that provision and allow individuals who are not registered voters but full-time residents to serve on nonregulatory boards if they can commit to be at a majority of the meetings.

That draft amendment might still change before town meeting in October, but Fossella and Van Hove were not appeased by the charter’s new allowances.

“So in other words, the very last person (the town) would ever consider is a part-timer," Van Hove said. "Any person in this town would be before a part-timer. It's almost laughable the way it’s drafted. It’s borderline insulting the way they drafted it.”

Last Monday, the Select Board adopted a 25 percent residential tax exemption, a 5 percent increase over last year. Town officials have touted the legally allowed exemption as a way to make Provincetown affordable for residents and keep lifelong residents in their homes. About 61 percent of the town’s homes are seasonal. Only 21 percent of the approved mortgages between 2007 and 2017 were for year-round homes, according to the Commission.

But the association sees it as a way to continue a widening gap between full-time and part-time residents.

“Eighty-five percent of every single expense is paid for by people who don’t participate,” Van Hove said.

“It’s easy to spend someone else’s money,” Fossella said. “It's not that we don’t want the town to spend money, it’s just we want to be participants in the discussion.”

After setting the new residential tax exemption, Provincetown Select Board member Thomas Donegan said that nonresident taxpayers can participate in budget hearings, even though they don’t have the right to vote in town.

“They can comment on any line items they want,” he said, adding that the hearings are where most of the substantive changes actually take place, not on the town meeting floor.

But part-timers rarely come to those meetings or send in comments, Donegan said.

“They have a voice they have not used,” he said. “I really do hope they all step up and participate more.”

But he doesn't feel that they should have voting rights in town.

“They are welcome and I want to hear from them, but I don’t think that the vote is the next step,” he said.

The Truro Association voiced its displeasure last summer when the Board of Selectmen approved a 20 percent tax exemption for year-round residents. State law allows for an exemption of up to 35 percent. At the time, town officials said the measure was nothing against part-time residents, just a way to help the year-round community.

But that decision has created a schism between part-timers and year-rounders, said Regan McCarthy, former president of the Truro Part-Time Taxpayers Association.

“In Truro it has had a very serious effect on the part-time community,” she said. “It has really divided our town. Now we’re not the same.”

The exemption has created an injustice in towns like Truro and Provincetown, where the town’s money is largely collected via property taxes, according to McCarthy. She called the exemption “lawful but awful.”

But Truro part-timers don’t seem to be at the point of asking for the right to vote, McCarthy said. They are in a bit of a reassessment period after the decision to implement the residential exemption.

“What we really want is a say that is respected,” she said. They came out in force at public meetings, she said, but felt that their voices weren’t heard. “If we could have a say, we wouldn’t care about the vote.”

Most part-timers are residents in other Massachusetts municipalities, so legislative change could be possible, and the association has raised possible state challenges. Part-timers in Truro can serve on nonregulatory boards and can speak at town meeting at the discretion of the moderator.

Because the Wellfleet town charter is silent on the issue, part-time residents can serve on boards and committees in Wellfleet, Town Administrator Daniel Hoort said. It is up to the appointing authority if it wishes to have a part-time resident serving, and there are currently a few part-timers serving in various posts. Wellfleet is constantly looking for people to fill board and committee vacancies, Hoort said

“The question, obviously, is are they here enough?” he said.

Wellfleet does not have a residential tax exemption, and the nonresident taxpayers association has not taken a stance on the vote, President Susan Reverby said.

“We’re just watching what’s happening,” she said.

The Brewster Association of Part Time Residents formed in 2002 in reaction to the creation of different tax rates for part-timers, according to Edward Goldman, co-president of the association.

That decision to institute different tax rates was later rescinded. Now, the association wants to maintain a good relationship between the part-timers and the town.

“I think the town treats us pretty well,” Goldman said. “We want to keep it that way.”

That doesn’t mean members don’t ask about the right to vote.

“Every part-time resident would like the right to vote,” he said. But that kind of fight would probably have to go through the legislature and would take time, money and lawyers.

Connecticut is one state that many associations look to as a model for voting rights.

Connecticut state law allows U.S. citizens who own property in Connecticut and are liable for at least $1,000 in property taxes the right to vote at town meetings.

Massachusetts has no such regulation, but in the Berkshires, which also has a large part-time population, towns also are getting into the fight. Passing something similar to Connecticut seems like an uphill battle, Goldman said.

“I think it’d be a very tough fight,” he said.

— Follow Ethan Genter on Twitter: @EthanGenterCCT