HIGHSTOWN – The Borough Council unanimously approved its 2016 budget at $6.7 million – which calls for a 1.5-cent increase in the municipal tax rate – during its council meeting on May 16.
The budget is basically $60,000 less than the prior year’s budget. According to Chief Financial Officer George Lang.
The tax rate for 2016 would be $1.177 per $100 of assessed value. The average township household, with homes assessed at $212,893, would see a municipal tax bill of about $2,505.75. For the average township household in 2015, homes were assessed at $212,600 and were seeing a municipal tax bill of about $2,470.41.
The 2016 budget is $6,787,340.10. That’s a decrease of $60,846.06, or a 0.89 percent from last year’s budget with total appropriations up 7.6 percent from 2010, or 1.2 percent per year, according to the statement.
The amount to be raised by taxes is $69,451, according to the document. Mr. Lang said that the tax levy goes up slightly at 1.53 percent.
“When you look at 2010 and compare it to 2016, expenses really have not gone up that much,” said Mr. Lang.
He said that 2010 was probably one of the worst years the borough had, when taxes actually went up $373 per residential household.
“In subsequent years, a couple of years it actually went down,” he said. “It’s been very steady. Even this year we are proposing a $35 modest increase over the entire year, which is less than $3 a month.”
The bottom line, he said, is that taxes have been stable. “Even considering we don’t get additional state aid,” he said. “Even with that, you’ve been able to really maintain the tax rate even with that drop in state aid so I think that’s very good.”
Mr. Lang said the borough has been steady with its tax collection percentage, with a more than 98 percent rate this year.
“We’ve also really taken control over tax appeals and canceled taxes,” he said, adding there hasn’t been that much.
At the meeting, Mr. Lang also viewed another sheet he had prepared which did a tax comparison on municipal taxes, regional school, county, county library, and county open spaces.
“The county is up 1.4 (cents), 1.5 (cents), maybe a little bit less,” he said. “I don’t know the county library numbers. It usually doesn’t move too much. So overall, we are looking at tax increase of less than 3-cents.
“School taxes did go up but because of our increase in ratables and our percentage of school taxes went down a little bit their tax levy should remain the same for 2016 as it was for in 2015,” he said.
As far as water and sewer, the borough is looking to holding steady on those rates.
“That seems to be working out and generating the kind of surplus that was projected by the administration,” said Mr. Lang.
An amendment was introduced to the budget after the public hearing which added three grants – Cultural Arts grant for $500, annual Clean Communities grant which was over $11,000, and a ClickIt or Ticket Grant for $5,000.
“Those are all revenues that offset with appropriations, so there are no impact on taxes,” said Mr. Lang.Borrough Administrator Henry Underhill called the budget pretty straightforward this year.
“We didn’t get thrown any real curve balls,” he said.
Resident Scott Caster took a few minutes during the public hearing to voice some concerns he had over the budget.
“I heard two of our professionals tonight say that this is a good thing and it is a good thing,” he said. “But I don’t think it’s good enough.”
Mr. Caster said that if the council takes a look at what other municipalities have. members would be alarmed and astonished at what they are missing.
“Mr. Lang said that we don’t have any extra aid,” he said. “I don’t believe the state doesn’t have it and I believe if you campout at the doorstep of the Community Affairs and bring your legislators with your hand out you will see hundreds of thousands of dollars of additional revenue that could be put into this budget.”
He said that he has heard some of this council and others councils especially in the last two, three, four years say that the state doesn’t have it.
“I don’t think that is the position to take,” he said. He said that one of the arguments to use is that theschool district is a regional school district.
“Approximately 86 percent of the ratables across the two municipalities that we have a regional school district in are in the township, and coincidentally, approximately 86 percent of the student body comes from the township,” he said.
Mr. Caster said he is disappointed that the council is not seeking additional aid.
“East Windsor Township is not the problem,” he said. “The cause of the problem is the State of New Jersey in that they set it up this way. All I’m asking for is equality.”
Mr. Caster also offered to help the council.
“If you need some support or help from somebody who has studied it and studied it and studied it, I’ve taken all the budgets of all the Mercer County towns,” he said. “I’ve laid them out on top of a table similar to one you are sitting at and I had to take a look at what was the difference of why did we have a high tax rate higher than all the others.”
During council comments, Council President Denise “Denny” Hansen addressed Mr. Caster’s concerns.
“I’m just going to be straightforward about this,” she said. “It’s a huge task that involves legislation. We need to ask what’s the first step? What’s the second step?”
She said that it could be something that is going on with a small committee and that she would be willing to help on that.
“What we need from you (Mr. Caster) is to suggest what is the first step,” she said. “Can we get somebody from the beginning, one of our legislators involved? It’s a daunting issue. We need to be able to say that we tried, and I agree with you there.”
