Garwood NJ, Big heart, big taxes!

Garwood, your taxes are about to skyrocket!

Big heart, big taxes!

Increases to the 2015 Budget include:

• $20,000 for Athletic Field Complex (AFC) Maintenance
• $11,000 for a fence for the Athletic Field
• $33,000 in debt service payments due to the AFC and neglected infrastructure projects*
• $7,000 increase to the Recreation department**
• $17,000 for the Planning Board**
• $11,100 to the Municipal Clerk**
• $23,845 initial cost for computer software
• $20,000 Taxes Raised
• $18,800 in Legal Fees
• $17,000 for pension line items
• $37,000 in Municipal Roof repairs that should be covered in the “surplus”
• Failure of the Finance Committee to understand and prepare for fluctuations in RVSA fees. Even though the fees are flat over the past 5 years, because of this failure we have to pay $90,000

*Not subject to cap is Debt Service; The Finance Committee does NOTHING to control costs. They put out fires and react to situations; they do not plan, foresee, anticipate or control expenditures.

**Items that we spent less than budgeted for last year, yet increased the budget this year.

We are just now beginning to see the ramifications of the excess debt we have taken on for the AFC.

$11,000 for a fence and $33,000 debt increase due to the AFC and neglected infrastructure projects. We were told the cost to maintain the Athletic Complex would be “$2,000”. Actual cost in the 2015 Budget is a 10x increase at: $20,000.

By approving the $3.2 million AFC without putting it up for the people of Garwood to vote on, the council ignored capital expenditures the Borough requires like Police Dispatch computer system, Police Dictaphone system, DPW equipment that is 30+ years old, the 30+ year old fire trucks and lack of a $1M ladder truck to fight fires at The Pointe, St. Anne's Senior housing (which, when opened, is going to create an even bigger drain on resources) and the fire on Second Avenue. There are streets in Garwood that have not been repaved in 40 years, sidewalks falling into disrepair, etc. Now we have to pay for all the items we already needed to borrow money for but hid from the public when the AFC was approved.

In addition, there is no synergy between the municipality and the Board of Education. We work in silos, which creates blown up budgets that hurt us, the taxpayers.  The BOE has already said they are raising taxes an average of $217 per house which may have been avoided with smart collaboration.

Municipal plus Board of Ed and County amounts to over 4% increase in property taxes

The purpose of this blog is to inform the residents of what goes on behind the closed doors of municipal hall because we are too busy with our lives to dig and see why our taxes are going up.


If you have any questions please reach out to us at garwoodgop@gmail.com