All or Nothin' At All

Washington, D.C is not the only place with a budget stalemate. Here in South Orange, we are currently facing our own stalemate, with the Board of Trustees evenly split over the proposed tax increase for this year. Myself, Trustee Gould and Trustee Bauer are advocating for a 0% municipal increase. Trustees David Ford, Levison and Rosner are advocating for a 2% increase.

While I cannot speak for my colleagues, I can certainly share MY opinion.

1. While there is now a 2% "cap" in place for tax increases, I do not think that maximizing increases should be our goal. We have such an enormous tax burden to begin with, every increase on top of that is "real" money and we should do what we can to minimize the increases.
2. We can actually accomplish a 0% increase this year, without ANY additional cuts in services. The most significant source of the revenue is from our recent settlement with our Police and Fire Unions. Over the past 3 years, we have been budgeting "x" for Police/Fire increases. However, until the arbitrator provided their ruling this year, that money has been accruing. The arbitrator's ruling was quite a bit less than had been budgeted, so the "excess" taxes that had been collected over the past 3 years should rightfully be returned to the taxpayers. We can accomplish that and STILL have additional funds in "surplus" to deal with any unexpected events next year.
3. This year Maplewood passed a budget with a 0% increase and it is important that we stay in close parity to them since our towns are so comparable in many ways.
4. Lastly, although we are being told we need a higher increase this year so as to not face a steep increase NEXT year, let me share that we have heard that same argument for each of the past 3 years, as per the following table. Things always look bad for the subsequent year and somehow, we always manage to significantly reduce the looming increase:

Year	Initial Tax Increase Estimate	ACTUAL Tax Increase
2008	13%	6.5%
2009	27%	3.9%
2010	29%	1.94%

Taxes have been spiraling out control for way too long, in South Orange, and throughout New Jersey. The time is finally right to take a stand and hold the line for once.

As always, I'd love to hear what you think.