They’ve gutted their budgets, shed staff and explored shared service deals with neighboring communities. It’s all part of running a town during a suffocating recession. At the same time, though, some mayors are finding creative ways to buy land and develop projects for what they say is a simple reason: The deals are simply too good to pass up....
An overflow crowd attends the "Review and Discussion of Governor Christie's Toolkit" session during the New Jersey State League of Municipalities annual conference in Atlantic City in this Nov. 17, 2010 file photo. They’ve gutted their budgets, shed staff and explored shared service deals with neighboring communities. It’s all part of running a town during a suffocating recession.
At the same time, though, some mayors are finding creative ways to buy land and develop projects for what they say is a simple reason: The deals are simply too good to pass up.
The result might be a new YMCA in Old Bridge or a farmland preservation project in North Brunswick, but any initiative must be undertaken on a landscape colored by high taxes.
"Unfortunately, we stand at the top of the ladder in median property taxes paid on homes, taxes as a percent of home value, and taxes as a percent of income," said James Hughes, dean of the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University.
As evidence of the pressures mayors face, Hughes noted that New Jersey residents enjoy the second-highest median incomes in the country, trailing only Maryland, but households also face the fourth-highest property values of any state, and the highest month costs for shelter.
For their police and fire protection, road repair, recreation and other government services, state residents pay the highest property taxes in the nation, a statewide median of $6,579, triple the $1,917 national average, Hughes said.
"This is not an easy place to survive," he said.
So when some mayors see an opportunity, they pounce.
In North Brunswick, officials put up $11 million in township funds, and received another $11 million from Middlesex County to purchase the Pulda family farm, saving a pristine 70-acre tract where deer still roam, and ending a developer’s plan for more than 300 homes.
"Development into single-family homes would have increased our education costs much more than the purchase price," Mayor Francis Womack said.
In Essex County, East Orange opened its first city-run senior center in October, the Bowser Family Senior Center, with a price tag of about $2.1 million. Though the project received state and federal funding, about $1.2 million came from the city’s capital budget.
"This was something we needed for so long for our seniors," Mayor Robert Bowser said. "It’s getting harder each year. There is always a statement of doing more with less, but it might just be that we have to do less now."
With billiard tables, rooms for exercise and computer classes, counseling services and health screenings, the center is the culmination of an eight-year battle to select a location and find the funding.
In Somerset County, Franklin Township spent $345,000 for development rights to 14 acres on Canal Road. Mayor Brian Levine called it one of the best moves for the municipality in all of 2010.
With nearly 60,000 residents, Franklin is the largest municipality in Somerset County. Buying up the development rights to the property will spare the township from additional housing construction and preserve the quality of life.
"It’s got the added bonus of saving millions of dollars in school construction and operating costs," Levine said. "It could also provide an economic spurt for the town, with people encouraged to walk around on its trails."
Parsippany Mayor Jamie Barberio said residents will realize savings from the township’s sewage treatment plant overhaul, which began earlier this year. The move cost about $22 million, but when completed, will save the taxpayers $850,000 per year, Barberio said.
The plant, with customers also in Montville, Mountain Lakes, East Hanover and Denville, is one of the largest consumers of power in the northeast United States.
The overhaul will reduce the number of tanks in the facility and swap out its outdated technology, which dates back to the plant’s opening in 1972.
"It will be state of the art," he said.
The project coincides with the town’s effort to build a new incinerator, which will be an additional revenue source for the town.
After years of planning and waiting, residents in Old Bridge, in Middlesex County, now have a YMCA, built without tax dollars. In a township of more than 65,000 residents, the recreation and community center is so popular, all family membership were sold earlier this year. The facility was expanded to accommodate more members.
At a cost of $8.5 million, the YMCA was financed with a $3.5 million grant from country freeholders, a $1 million donation from the Old Bridge-Sayreville Rotary, and the membership fees.
"It doesn’t cost the taxpayers a penny," said Mayor James Phillips, whose town saw layoffs of municipal employees in 2009. The township recently voted to sell municipal land to the township utilities authority, a move that, in part, will provide funds to meet budget caps for next year.
Staff writers Aliza Applebaum, Dan Goldberg and Eugene Paik contributed to this report.