Governor Paterson, setting the stage for his first clash with state lawmakers, is expected today to call on the Legislature to impose vastly tighter controls on local property taxes.

State officials said Mr. Paterson would declare his support for a property tax cap modeled after a 28-year-old Massachusetts statute, which has been credited with dramatically reducing local taxes in the Bay State. The governor may advance legislation to establish a cap.

Mr. Paterson’s endorsement of the idea of imposing a ceiling on school property tax increases — the key recommendation of a report to be released by a special commission, led by the executive of Nassau County, Thomas Suozzi — places him at odds with fellow Democrats in the Legislature and powerful labor groups in Albany.

The commission, which was appointed by the former governor, Eliot Spitzer, in January, calls on Albany to cap annual growth in the school property tax levy at either 4% or 120% of inflation, whichever is less. The limit is significantly lower than the average growth in school property taxes, which have increased at an annual rate of 7% since 2002. It’s also higher than the one imposed in Massachusetts, which sets a local tax limit at 2.5%.

The Paterson administration released the commission’s 105-page report to reporters yesterday and will officially announce its recommendations today.

The governor’s proposal for a cap is likely to face objections from the Democratic speaker of the Assembly, Sheldon Silver, who has warned that restricting property tax growth would threaten education funding by punching holes in local school budgets that Albany may not be able to fill.

“Any action that we take must guarantee that schoolchildren across the state will have the resources necessary to get a quality education,” Mr. Silver said in a statement yesterday.

That’s the position taken by the state’s largest teachers union, a major force in Albany, which has vowed to pressure lawmakers not to approve a cap.

Senate Republicans, who are balancing their more fiscally conservative positions and their fear of upsetting the union in an election year, have indicated that they would be unwilling to approve a cap unless they are joined by the Assembly.

Mr. Silver’s reservations were echoed by the state comptroller, Thomas DiNapoli, a Democrat, who said in a statement that he was “concerned about the State’s ability to keep up its end of the bargain and continue to increase education funding.”

For voters outside New York City, property taxes have been a burning concern for years, promoting increased calls for the state to take more extreme measures to curb the growth.

Mr. Spitzer announced the commission in his State of the State address, saying New York needed a “blunt instrument” to give relief to homeowners.

“This is the most pro-taxpayer report that Albany has seen in some time,” a special adviser to the commission, Robert Ward, who is a researcher at the Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government, said.

While counties, towns, and villages all collect property taxes, school districts collect the largest share, about 60% of levies.

The report recommends that the levy cap apply to homes and businesses that existed the previous tax year. School districts would be allowed to exceed the cap by taxing new construction.

If a district taxes residents below the cap in a given year, it could bank the difference in a future year and exceed the cap by a limited amount, the report says.

School districts would no longer have to submit their budgets for a vote. Under the present system, districts present budgets in elections that have historically have low turnout — usually between 10% and 20% — and are heavily influenced by the teacher unions.

Voters instead would be able to override the cap. The percentage of the vote needed for an override would depend on how much state aid a school district receives. If a district receives more than a 5% increase in operating aid, then it would need support from at least 60% of voters to exceed the cap. If it gets less than 5%, then 55% of voters would be required to override, the report says.

Voters would have the option of placing on the ballot an “underride” vote to keep the levy growth below the cap.

In Massachusetts, override attempts have succeeded about 40% of the time. Only a few dozen “underride” votes have taken place since 1980, about half of which were approved.

Voters now have a choice between accepting the budget or a contingency plan that provides for teacher salaries and benefits and usually approximates the original plan.

The report argued that turnout would rise if voters were given power over the tax levy.

“The Commission believes that changing the school budget vote from a vote on the budget to a vote on the tax levy would highlight the interconnection of school spending and the property tax,” the report said.

The commission is also recommending that the state channel $2 billion that it now spends on a program that provides exemptions and rebates to homeowners toward a “circuit breaker” that would give grants to homeowners when their taxes consume a certain percentage of their income.

The cost of running schools is a major cause of the high taxes. New York spends an estimated $18,768 a student — a higher amount than any state in the nation and 50% higher than the national average.

New York schools have high labor costs, which to a large degree are a consequence of state labors laws that give teacher unions powerful leverage over contract negotiations.

At the same time, local governments in New York shoulder a greater burden of paying for schools than in other states. While Albany pays about 43% of the total education budget, many other state governments contribute closer to 50%.

State lawmakers have shied away from setting limits on how much localities can tax, but have dealt with the problem by spending billions of dollars each year on a program first started by Governor Pataki that is supposed to lower school taxes by providing districts with subsidies and homeowners with rebate checks.

As the commission noted, the subsidies not only failed to slow tax growth but may have encouraged districts to increase their levies. Over the last five years, property tax levies have grown by an average of 5% a year, although the rate has tapered in the last year, mostly due to a record surge in state education aid.

State residents outside of New York City, which relies much more heavily on income taxes to pay for services, pay about 54% more in property taxes as a percentage of their income than the national average.

The report notes that nine of the 10 counties with the highest property taxes as a percentage of home value are in New York State.

In an interview, Mr. Suozzi said a cap would benefit New York City by encouraging state lawmakers to streamline state mandates that drive up the labor costs of schools, including ones in the city.