BY ELAINE VAN DEVELDE
Staff Writer
Voters in Edison said no on Nov. 2 to 15 more years of using taxpayer money to preserve open space and also nixed a measure to preserve history.
The vote to extend the current open space tax of 1 cent for each $100 of assessed valuation from 2014 to 2029 went down by 13,100 votes to 11,109.
A companion question that would have allowed the township to use 25 percent of the extended open space tax to preserve the aging Thomas Alva Edison Memorial Tower in Roosevelt Park was also defeated by 12,305 votes to 11,491.
Of Edison’s 52,308 registered voters, 34,210, or roughly 65 percent went to the polls, according to figures provided by the municipal clerk’s office.
And several residents here had mixed feelings about election results.
“Once a developer gets their hands on land, it is gone forever,” said resident Jane Tousman, who is a member of the township Open Space Committee. “That is why I am truly disappointed that the questions did not pass. I disagree with the critics. I think we have been able to preserve quite a bit of land and at bargain prices, because you have to factor in the fact that having the tax affords us the opportunity to take advantage of matching state grants.”
Anthony Russomanno, a local Democratic municipal committeeman, spent $2,200 of his own money on fliers and advertisements to lobby against the two ballot questions.
“I’m feeling victorious, but it’s also a sad day when voters show that they truly don’t trust officials in this town who are supposed to protect their best interests to spend their money wisely,” he said. “I got the facts out to people. They saw how their money was being misused, and they said, ‘No more.’ ”
Councilman Charles Tomaro, who spearheaded the effort to put the questions on the ballot, said Russomanno’s campaign against the questions was misinformed.
The open space tax has brought in about $750,000 a year for the purchase of open space since 1999. But the trust fund account to pay for land bonded for now is depleted or spoken for through 2014.
Proponents of the open space question wanted the extension to buy as much land as possible before the market value of developable land increased.
The tax works like a mortgage, said Open Space Committee Chairman Walter Stochel.
The township puts up the money and the tax, which is kept in a trust fund, pays the bond payments, he said.
The township has more than 500 acres of open space. Roughly 111 acres were acquired using open space tax funds.
Those 111 acres were also a catalyst to preserving the other 400 or so, Stochel said.
When township, county and state parks are counted into the tally of active and/or passive recreational space, it ups the total to 1,300 acres, he said.
There are roughly 1,000 acres of vacant land left in the township that should be bought and preserved by the township before the acreage is gone for good, said Stochel.
Russomanno, however, provided appraised values of land and prices paid for it. He says that the owners of the properties sold to the township are politically connected developers and the tax is a guise to get more money in their pockets by having the township buy their land.
“You have to be blind to not see the connections and the inflated prices are right on the appraisal lists,” Russomanno said. “I couldn’t make this up if I wanted to. Unfortunately, it’s all true.”