A Better Town Budget

Considering the township always produces lower tax hikes during an election year than an off year, it’s very tempting to say this year’s municipal budget is just another election scam. However, I’m tempted to believe it’s more evidence that interim town manager, Holly Reycraft, is doing her job.

Taxes are nearly flat, about a 0.6% increase over last year, or $8 a year for the typical property owner. Employee benefits were brought under control. The police department cut salary expenditures.

Now, we have another first for the township.

Historically, the library budget never appeared in the municipal budget but it was secretly included in the tax base. When the state imposed a cap on municipal tax increases, including the library tax as part of the tax base gave the township about a 10% boost in how much it was allowed to raise property taxes.

For example, if the township had a tax base of $7.5 milllion a 4% state-imposed cap would have restricted tax increases to $300,000. However, if the library $750,000 tax revenue was added to the township’s base, then the cap would have been a $330,000 increase.

In truth, the township has always worked around the cap, raising taxes on average 10% a year for the past number of years, but now they’ll have one less gimmick to use.

Under the revised budget, library taxes are broken out as a separate item and are no longer calculated toward the cap (Sheet 3b). It’s another step towards a more honest and fiscally conservative budget.

Since the town’s on a roll, maybe it can do something with the $100,000 slush fund that’s still “dedicated” to Councilman Vinci’s intersection, even though it’s been built for years. Or maybe actually use the $39,000 dedicated towards the Henry Hudson Trail (page 9). >>> Read more!

Kudos to Cops

Too often, the taxpayers feel they work for the government rather than the other way around. In that light, we should take great pride in the recent actions of the Aberdeen Township Police Department. In addition to the great work they consistently do, the police department recently responded to two criticisms voiced on this blog:

1) The department needs to cut spending
2) The department should maintain a public police blotter

Well, the police department has done both. The final town budget notes a $30,000 cut in police wages and salary from the original proposal (probably in reduced overtime). Granted, even after this haircut, department wages will still increase 4.7% over last year. However, it remains precedent setting. This is the first time I ever recall seeing a budgeted salary decrease that didn’t involve a termination.

The cut also creates a new baseline and will hopefully translate into annual savings for years to come as well as reduced pension obligations.

Next, the police department has launched an online police blotter. Considering a police officer’s primary duty is to uphold the law and prevent crime, I’m happy to see the arrests have not been for major criminal activity.

Special thanks to Chief of Police Powers. >>> Read more!

What’s Next?

The blog has been in decline ever since I left town and with good reason. I no longer live in Aberdeen. I don’t see what’s happening, my relationships are no longer the same, I’m not personally involved, and I don’t have easy access to records.

At the same time, virtually every elected official I fought against is either out or on the way out.

So, what’s left to do? I’ve given thought to writing about state or national issues, particularly in the areas of education, but this blog has always been about ideas that could be converted into policy.

There are still plenty of hot button issues in town – Pay-to-play, teacher contracts, police contracts, the fire companies, health and pension benefits, spending and tax increases, development projects, COAH, municipal elections, student performance, and the list goes on.

But I don’t have the information.

For example, CME, the town’s engineer, is being awarded big bucks at nearly every town hall meeting in exchange for their funding the Aberdeen democrats in November’s election. But the real data lies in getting a copy of the town’s payment history to CME. Easy to do if you live in town but I no longer do.

Once again, the Aberdeen democrats have chosen to circumvent election financial disclosure laws by running four “independent” campaigns that magically divide all revenue and expenses four-ways and run the identical campaigns.

The one new twist is Kathleen Olsen, the recently retired middle school principal, is now the chairperson and treasurer for all four of the democrats’ “independent” campaigns.

So, what’s next? Dunno. But Aberdeen is a great town with great people and I’m hopeful someone will step forward to assume the mantle of Aberdeener.

Till then, the blog will continue but it won’t be what it once was. >>> Read more!

What Isn't Happening in Aberdeen

Workshop Meeting, May 17, 2011 –

Holly Reycraft stated she spoke to Dan McCarthy regarding projects, Anchor Glass is a standstill; New Jersey Transit is holding up Transit Village; an agreement is being worked on with the Senior Center; Seawall – garbage pails are ordered with Clean Community Grant money, we are restricting 100 feet for the fishermen to fish – 50 feet one end and 50 feet the other end.

Bless her soul. It’s a wonderful thing to have a competent town manager with no personal or political agenda.

Council Meeting, May 17, 2011 –

Mr. Weinstein asked what is going on with the old pool club.

Ms. Reycraft stated they took buildings down and is starting to get work done.

Mayor Tagliarini stated he is looking to move quickly, they are waiting for zoning board approvals, the plans are beautiful.

Did the Mayor say “waiting”? That seems like a fair use of the word. After all, those beautiful plans were drawn about three years ago.

As for the hundred acres at Aberdeen Forge in Freneau, why ask?

But there is good news. Cifelli appears well on his way towards building more unwanted housing and CME Associates is about to be awarded another $372,500. Come November, the Democrats’ war chest will be overflowing.

Yup, looks like the next decade will look a lot like the last decade. >>> Read more!

On This Memorial Day

The following is an excerpt from General Douglas MacArthur’s May 12, 1962 speech at West Point, entitled “Duty, Honor, Country.”

Notice how little has changed in the past fifty years.

Duty, Honor, Country.

The code which those words perpetuate embraces the highest moral laws and will stand the test of any ethics or philosophies ever promulgated for the uplift of mankind. Its requirements are for the things that are right, and its restraints are from the things that are wrong.

The soldier, above all other men, is required to practice the greatest act of religious training -- sacrifice.

In battle and in the face of danger and death, he discloses those divine attributes which his Maker gave when he created man in his own image. No physical courage and no brute instinct can take the place of the Divine help which alone can sustain him.

However horrible the incidents of war may be, the soldier who is called upon to offer and to give his life for his country is the noblest development of mankind.

You now face a new world -- a world of change. The thrust into outer space of the satellite, spheres, and missiles mark the beginning of another epoch in the long story of mankind. In the five or more billions of years the scientists tell us it has taken to form the earth, in the three or more billion years of development of the human race, there has never been a more abrupt or staggering evolution. We deal now not with things of this world alone, but with the illimitable distances and as yet unfathomed mysteries of the universe. We are reaching out for a new and boundless frontier.

We speak in strange terms: of harnessing the cosmic energy; of making winds and tides work for us; of creating unheard synthetic materials to supplement or even replace our old standard basics; to purify sea water for our drink; of mining ocean floors for new fields of wealth and food; of disease preventatives to expand life into the hundreds of years; of controlling the weather for a more equitable distribution of heat and cold, of rain and shine; of space ships to the moon; of the primary target in war, no longer limited to the armed forces of an enemy, but instead to include his civil populations; of ultimate conflict between a united human race and the sinister forces of some other planetary galaxy; of such dreams and fantasies as to make life the most exciting of all time.

And through all this welter of change and development, your mission remains fixed, determined, inviolable: it is to win our wars.

God bless our fallen soldiers and their families. They sacrificed their lives so we may live free. God bless our military, our veterans, and their families, for their service and sacrifice. Our nation is in your debt. >>> Read more!