by Audrey Levine, The Packet Group
ROBBINSVILLE — A June 1 switch to in-house garbage collection throughout the township, with a savings of almost $78,000 in contractual costs, is being included in the 2009 budget that still carries a tax rate hike of a little more than a penny.
Mayor Dave Fried on April 23 presented the Township Council with the $18.2 million budget, which represents a 6-percent increase from the 2008 budget of $17.1 million.
”We started with the goal of not raising taxes,” Mayor Fried said during his presentation. “We went back to zero in almost every department to start over (with the budget). But we have kept capital projects to a minimum and maximized cost savings.”
Mayor Fried said the township is going to see a decrease of $77,716 in contractual costs once the switch is made to total in-house garbage collection.
Public Works Director Dino Colarocco said the township has been doing this kind of collection on a trial basis at Town Center since June 1, 2007, but will extend it to all of Robbinsville once the contract with Waste Management, of Hamilton, expires May 31.
”We thought this was a better way of providing service,” he said in a separate interview. “We can do the collection cheaper.”
With the current contract, Mr. Colarocco said, the township pays $95,000 to Waste Management for the collection. He said the township would pay between $20,000 and $25,000 to do the collection in-house.
”We are confident we can do a better job with quality control,” Mayor Fried said.
Mr. Colarocco said the township already is prepared with garbage trucks to begin the in-house collection in June. In 2007, he said, the township purchased three trucks, two to replace old ones and a third to begin the in-house collection at Town Center.
A fourth truck was purchased in December in anticipation of the change to full in-house collection, he said.
The current collection schedule will be maintained once the switch is made, Mr. Colarocco said, for the convenience of the residents.
”This will be a smooth transition,” he said. “Hopefully, residents will not notice any change, except better service.”
In addition, the mayor said, the township will save an additional $74,340 by not separating grass collection, instead, collecting it with regular trash. Township Administrator Mary Caffrey said doing this will eliminate the need for separate trips to collect the trash and the grass, in turn reducing labor and fuel costs.
Despite these savings, one of the main reasons for the 1.2-cent tax rate increase, Mayor Fried said, is the council’s desire to move forward with the full pension payment of $842,454 rather than entering into the state’s deferral plan to pay half this year and the other half over 15 years, beginning in April 2012. That plan carries with it an interest rate of about 10 percent each year.
”I would have liked to present a budget with a tax cut, but we don’t want to do the pension deferral,” he said.
The proposed budget includes a 3-percent increase in the tax rate, raising it to 37.2 cents per $100 of assessed property value. For a homeowner assessed at the latest average township assessment of $400,000, the municipal tax bill will be $1,488, an increase of $48 for a homeowner assessed at the same average last year.
The 2009 budget, with the complete pension payments, is $353,834 below the 3.5 percent spending cap.
”With this, there is room to make adjustments if the council wants,” Mayor Fried said. “And we can bank for 2010.”
The biggest challenges, Mayor Fried said, came from a 12 percent increase in medical insurance as well as the first cut ever, by about $42,000, to Robbinsville’s portion of state energy tax receipts, which is money generated by sales and taxes on energy or utility services, among others. Funds are collected in a dedicated fund by the state, then distributed to municipalities.
This year, he said, the township will receive about $1.64 million in energy tax receipts as opposed to about $1.68 million in 2008.
Still, with this budget, the township also will be saving about $75,000 annually through its interlocal agreement with Hamilton for sewer utility services, the mayor said. That is in addition to more than $100,000 in savings since the township absorbed the Municipal Utilities Authority in 2007, eliminating rent on a building, salaries for board members and other cost reductions, according to Ms. Caffrey.
As for salaries for nonunion employees, Mayor Fried announced three different options for the year. The first, he said, allows employees to take a straight 2 percent base raise. The second provides a 3 percent raise effective July 1, and the third offers a 3 percent raise effective Jan. 1 with the requirement to take five furlough days.
According to Ms. Caffrey, the first option nets the most money for employees with the amount lowering with each new option.
”But we came up with these ideas by listening to the employees,” Mayor Fried said.
Other cost savings came from equipment changes as Mayor Fried said the township only will have to purchase two new township vehicles, rather than the usual three. He said the township has hired mechanics who made adjustments to the current vehicles that allowed them to last for an extra year.
Council President Christine Ciaccio said now that the budget has been presented, the council will take the next few weeks to look through it and meet with department heads to decide if any changes could, or should, be made. After that process is complete, in late May and June, she said, residents will have the opportunity to speak out about the budget before a final vote is taken.
Councilwoman Sonja Walter said at the meeting she would like to request the council hold an additional budget meeting prior to the next regularly scheduled May 14 meeting, but Ms. Ciaccio said they would not be able to schedule this in time.
”I think it is quite troubling that, even though we finally received our budget books at (the April 23 meeting), there is no opportunity to publicly review and comment on it in advance of the election,” Ms. Walter said in an e-mail Friday. “The budget should be a way for the residents to ‘grade’ the current administration.”
The Township Council is expected to discuss the budget, including police costs, at its May 14 meeting.

