As anyone who reads this blog knows, I pin most (but certainly not all) of the blame for our astronomical property taxes directly on Trenton. It’s never ending redistributionist schemes and it’s interference in local affairs has made municipal budgeting close to impossible. I have outlined the massive amount of state mandates several times, including here. Even super-progressive mayor Ken Pringle has on several occasions bemoaned the meddling in Belmar’s affairs by his mostly Democratic brethren in Trenton.
Finally we may see a modicum of relief. The Assembly’s Environment and Solid Waste Committee is holding a hearing Thursday to look at the mandate problem. Assembly Committee Chair (and former West Orange mayor) John McKeon says that all state mandates are at risk of being scaled back or eliminated. Let’s hope he means it. Personally, I would eliminate every single one of them. State governments (especially the ongoing train wreck that is our state government) have no business telling the towns what to do or not do.
If you really care about our property tax problem please contact one or all the the committee’s members today or tomorrow. I plan to call all of them later on today.
They are:
McKeon, John F. – Chair
Gusciora, Reed – Vice-Chair
Click on their name for their contact info.
Tell them the best thing they can do about property taxes is to restore sovereignty to local governments. Our locally elected officials (even Belmar’s) know much better what our spending priorities should be than they could possibly know from down the opposite end of Route 195.
P.S. It really wasn’t fair of me to refer to the New Jersey state government as a train wreck. No train wreck ever resulted in liabilities of over $100 billion. I apologize to all the train wrecks for my irresponsible comment.
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