Fair Haven's Budget Remains Flat for 6th Year

The number six is no sign of evil to Fair Haven officials. It's what they might, instead, call their sign of good budget times.

For the sixth year in a row, after some grappling with capital cuts, the governing body has introduced a municipal budget that will not burden taxpayers with a hike. Zero. That's the other number officials over which officials feel justified in patting themselves on the back.

Keeping taxes level for that many consecutive years while keeping a healthy amount of surplus in the bank is a feat that is rare in the state of New Jersey, especially in tough financial times, Administrator Theresa Casagrande said at Monday night's Borough Council meeting.

"I have done some preliminary research, and I believe that, in recent history, there are only three other municipalities out of the 566 in the state of New Jersey that have managed not to increase their municipal tax rate for six years in a row," the administrator said. "This governing body has taken many innovative and progressive actions in the past six years to help them achieve this very noteworthy feat."

Casagrande called attention to the fact that capital improvement plans have proceeded, despite cuts in spending. She also noted that despite previously aired concerns about the possibility of straining the surplus to keep municipal taxes level, "the bottom line is that in this year's budget, we are only appropriating $995,000 from our fund balance, which is $365,000 than we appropriated last year." The surplus left is a very healthy one, Casagrande said.

Hurricane Sandy-related expenses did not require emergency appropriations, which saved the borough, as one fifth of any of those appropriations allotted would have had to have been raised for this year's budget, according to Casagrande.

"When we receive our FEMA and insurance reimbursements from Sandy expenditures, we will be able to reimburse the various trust funds that we used to offset our 2013 storm line item," she explained.

Also credited with reaping borough savings were the various shared service agreements with the schools and Rumson.

The first draft budget, discussed at the two prior council meetings, proposed a 1.1-cent per $100 of property value increase. Considering that the average property in Fair Haven is assessed at $550,678, that translated to an average hike on the municipal portion of the tax bill to about $62 a year.

Any increase was too much of an increase for some council members. So, they went to work cutting an estimated $150,000 from the spending plan.

The budget's pubic hearing is slated for the May 13 council meeting.