Englishtown Borough Council Adopts 2011 Municipal Budget, Raising Taxes

The 2011 Englishtown Municipal Budget was adopted at a Borough Council meeting on Monday, April 25. Two separate periods of time were appropriated for public comment, but no citizens came to the meeting to voice their opinions on the municipal budget. 

The 2011 Englishtown Municipal budget calls for a 2 cent per $100 assessed property value tax increase.

The total operating appropriations within CAP is $1,564,260, which is $246,465 beneath the allowable CAP. The 2 percent CAP is applied to $1,508,455 of the budget, which is equivalent to $30,169.

The maximum allowable amount to be raised by taxation is $1,103,773, but the borough  is only seeking $1,021,507.97 to be raised from taxes, which is $82,265 beneath the CAP. 

$209,006.16 of the budget is excluded from the 2 percent CAP.

During council discussion on the budget, Carr stated that no conversation about cutting the budget to bring the taxes down to zero never occurred, but rather meetings were held about whether the council should or should not lower the taxes in general. 

“There’s places in this budget that we could cut some money and bring it down as close to zero as we can. To just push this through without having a review of what is in there that could be taken out, in my opinion is irresponsible, and there is no way that I could vote to approve it,” Carr said.    

Carr identified that cuts could be made by eliminating the 2 percent raises for all borough employees, the increase in police overtime and additional police cruisers, and  the dental insurance and prescription plan policies. Furthermore, Carr stated that the surplus in water, sewer, and current funds could be used to mitigate the taxes. 

Carr has indicated her displeasure with the municipal budget from the get-go. In a Carr felt that the surplus funds coming from water and sewer revenues and court revenues could be put towards the budget to guarantee a zero tax increase for citizens.

The anticipated surplus for 2011 is $303,000.  This money comes from licenses, municipal court fines and costs, interest and costs on taxes, interests on investments and deposits, anticipated utility operating surplus, and off-duty administrative fees.

“I think to get $50,000 out of [the surplus] to bring this to zero -- you could take a little bit here, a little bit there, or any one item -- but I think it would behoove us to review that and to bring this budget in at zero, especially since we are giving out raises,” Carr said. “I am not saying that I am against the raises, but I think that if we are giving out raises in this economy that we should not be raising taxes to do so.”

Mayor Thomas Reynolds asked the council if they would like to review the surplus or eliminate some of the budgeted items that Carr suggested; no council member wished to further discuss cutting items from the budget. 

However, Councilwoman Krawiec brought up the necessity of sharing vehicle repair with Manalapan Township for both the Department of Public Works and the police department, but the township has not continued the conversation since it was last discussed in March. 

The prescription and dental plans are negotiated contract items with the Englishtown Police Department and cannot be taken out of the budget, Mayor Reynolds explained. The borough council and the police department are currently still in negotiations. 

Councilwoman Maryanne Krawiec, Councilwoman Lori Cooke, Councilman Gregory W. Wojyn, and Councilwoman Cindy Robilotti voted to adopt the budget, Councilman Rudolph Rucker was absent, and Councilwoman Jayne Carr voted no.