By Sean Ruppert, Staff Writer
EAST WINDSOR The Township Council this week picked through its proposed budget and identified numerous small cuts that would lessen the tax rate increase by close to a penny.
With the new reductions from this year’s earlier proposed figures, the tax rate would rise by about 6 cents over 2008.
In their second public meeting devoted solely to the budget, on Tuesday, the council methodically reviewed the spending plan and cut the operating expenses on dozens of line items by amounts that generally ranged between $100 and $1,500.
”This does really add up. You’re going to be surprised,” said Mayor Janice Mironov.
The total of the cuts identified adds up to about $100,000 and would result in a municipal tax rate of 62.9 cents per $100 of assessed value. This means the owner of a home assessed at the township average of $133,719 would pay $841 in municipal property taxes, an increase of $79 from 2008.
Most of the cuts came from expenses like printing supplies, advertising, meetings and conferences, training and other miscellaneous equipment categories. A few of the larger cuts included $7,000 from code enforcement overtime and $8,000 from group insurance vision coverage.
Mayor Mironov said Thursday that there may be some additional fine tuning, but that large changes are unlikely.
”I do believe we are winding down our discussion and that the budget will end up in this general place,” she said. “We have gone through every penny in every account and we feel that we have squeezed as much as we reasonably can.”
She said, however, that the council has not yet set a date to introduce the budget and there might be more discussion on the spending plan at the council’s next regular meeting on April 21.
In addition to the cuts, the rest of the council also publicly came out for the first time Tuesday against using a state-proposed pension deferral plan. The mayor had previously spoken out against the idea of using the deferral, and the budget as constructed did not assume the deferral.
”I believe this option only burdens future budgets,” Mayor Mironov repeated Tuesday.
The deferral option, signed into law by Gov. Jon Corzine earlier this year, allows towns to halve their contributions into the state-run Public Employees’ Retirement System and Police and Firemen’s Retirement System for one year. The municipalities then would have to make up the difference along with their regular pension payments over the next 15 years, with interest.
Mayor Mironov put the question to the rest of the council Tuesday, and council members unanimously backed her position against the deferral, with shakes of their heads.
Had the council decided to take the deferral, it would have reduced the tax rate by an additional 4.26 cents, resulting in a smaller increase of about 1.7 cents per $100 of assessed value from 2008. This would have increased the average tax bill by $29.
Mayor Mironov previously cited declining revenues and surplus as significant contributors to the proposed tax hike.
The township saw a reduction of $113,269 in total formula aid from the state for 2009.
The budget does not call for any layoffs or furloughs of existing employees. However, some positions are being eliminated or combined through attrition.
Many capital projects are being frozen under the proposed budget.

