The February 17, 2009 Township special budget meeting...

[Guest]

The February 17, 2009 Township special budget meeting notice has been posted.

http://www.cranburytownship.org/TC_Agenda_021709.pdf

[Guest]

Right now the buget will increase by 1.5 million, but the tax payer out of pocket expense will hold for the municpal part because the TC is using 1.5 million from the surplus. I question this use as it is akin to someone saying they can afford a house because for one year they will use their savings to pay the mortgage. Once the year is up the obligation is there, but there is no money to pay the loan. Mr. Stannard and Mr. Cody both questioned the approach and Mr. Cody pushed for a second review of line items which is being done.

I can't see how the town can do a salary freeze for employees and still come out 1.5 million dollars worse for it. Using surplus is not the answer, unless we want further problems. They never bid the planner or attorney which alone are large expenses and should have been put to bid to reduce costs.

[scared]

Are you saying they are tricking us by spending surplus and that we will have the same shorfall next year?

[Guest]

It depends on ones view, not sure trick is the right word.

They are open that they are using surplus to cover the added cost. However, at Monday's meeting Pari and David were saying they controlled costs and we would not see a tax increase because of the use of surplus. I don't believe saying there is no tax increase means the use of surplus should be over looked. If surplus is used it means it is money no longer available to us. Which was at one point a reason used by the same people for a tax increase and statement of bad management. For example, with a zero increase budget and keeping that 1.5 mill we could have possibly preserved land. Would you want land preserved or money used to cover added costs for one year? Just one example.

[Guest]

Once the surplus is gone, it is gone. Our problem at the state level government is similar except it doesn't spend down surplus (we don't have one!), it incurs more debt, even for what I consider operating expenses. They do not attend to the structural, recurring problem in our budget.

At our local level, I would urge caution about spending down our surplus. Given the uncertainty over the length of this economic crisis, our problems may be around for a while. Spending surplus is only a temporary fix available to us for as long as it lasts. We need to tighten the belt and drop non-essential spending. I'd curtail overtime spending (esp. when the work being done can be done during the normal work week if one were motivated to do so...) and eliminate any special project spending.

Can someone please explain to me the library situation. Namely, I understand they have a surplus ($500,000 or so?). If the library is funded from public dollars, why do they hold the surplus as opposed to the town? And I understand also there is some issue about reducing the annual public support by reducing the rate used in a funding formula. Not being critical since I don't yet understand the issue...I genuinely want info to understand it better.

[Guest]

Telling taxpayers not to worry about a budget increase because taxes will remain flat due to a surplus is frankly misdirection. The issue should be, regardless of the means to pay, is the budget increase essential? I don't know enough to answer that yet, but institinctly I skeptical about whether the budget was approached from the right POV.

The right POV in this economy, for other local, state govervment, for businesses and for individual households, is to meaingfully cut-back, to forgo any important but non-essential expenses, to hold the line on salaries and hiring, etc. If this budget adds even one new employee or gives any raises, for example, it is flawed and inrresponsible in the current environment. Most companies are freezing salaries and cutting heds. Why should we be different? Maintenance projects should be deferred, costs for public events scaled back, etc.

[Guest]

The other question is whether the 5 million in surplus was justified to start. A surplus that large could indicate that perhaps our taxes were too high to start and that budgeting was not properly done in the past. Under that scenario, why do we have faith this year or next. Either way there are substantial questions.

- Why do we have such a large surplus, when Mr. Stannard said at the meeting on Monday that the surplus was no where near that large last year. Were we over paying?

- Why are we using the 1.5 million now and could further savings be stripped through further expense reduction or could it be less if contracts were bid?

- At the meeting Mr. Stout and Ms. Stave stated 2010 would be painful and that it is likely to be a tax increase of substantial size. Why not look today to strip expenses so next year if it is bad we can use surplus if no other options exist. Is this politics being played or fair warning?

- Mr. Stout and Ms. Stave stated that we've been paying for past administrations. Yet both have been elected multiple times. At what point can blame on others stop and personal acceptance occur. If Mr. Cody said this it would be a fair comment, you can't blame a guy who just stepped in. After multiple wins and years in office, that's no longer a valid statement for the others.

[Guest]

Can someone explain why the budget has increased by such an exorbidant amount? An increase of 1.5 million is what percentage of the entire budget?

[Guest]

Is this special budget meeting open to the public? It would be good if some people attend to share their concerns with the committee.

[Guest]

I could not make the budget meeting tonight. What happened? Any news as to why there is a 1.5 million increase in our towns budget?

[Jay T.]

The TC attendees last night were Pari, David and Win. Win came to the meeting with a final check list of items to see if they could be reduced. There were a number of them so I can't list them all here. I do know he questioned items such as:

- Can we hire temporary help such as a college student to do the state required dog census as opposed to paying employees over time to do the work.

- Do we need to spend 10,000 on a bulky housing study with the planner?

- Could the town agree to carefully review any position whether we need to replace an employee if they were to leave.

- Can we reduce overtime budgets.

Also mentioned by all was the idea of perhaps the town going to some sort of flex schedule where they may have evening hours, but reduce day time hours. Or does it make sense for the Town hall to be open only 4 days a week instead of 5 if it saves money. No decision was taken on this, it was just an idea discussed.

An interesting note is that Win was the only one who had a final prepared list of items to review on the budget. It saved around 7,700.

[Dan Mulligan]

Both Jay and I were at the meeting last night along with a few other residents, and yes it was good to see Win taking the lead in reviewing the budget once again line by line and as a result finding more saving for the taxpayers.

Seeing Win in action last night validated for me why we elected him.

A few questions and comments were asked at the end of the meeting during public comment regarding affordable housing and the Updike barn. When I spoke I asked about the surplus.

It was explained to us that typically Cranbury runs a surplus each year and above and beyond what we are using in the budget this year we have about another $4.5 million in surplus currently. I was then told offline by a resident we typically run about $ 5.0 million in surplus each year.

As for the question earlier in this thread about an extra 1.5 million in the budget this year. I did not ask about it specifically. However based on what I have found on the township web site regarding previous budgets it appears we typically use surplus from the previous year in the current years budget.

[Guest]

Management of overtime hours is certainly one avenue to explore. I cannot comment on what this may cost our town, however, it is clear that there are many in the state that game the system to maximize overtime pay.

[Guest]

Any increase in the number of Township employees?

The number of employees for the past years:

2006: 70
2007: 86 (a big increase!)
2008: 88

This page has all the details:
http://cranbury.info/viewtopic.php?t=2334

[Guest]

[Guest]

Agreed. Another poster shared some discussion of a study of street scapes/house sizes that occurred on TC. There is talk about Library funding, etc. This is a clear and urgent time to focus on needs, not wants. That said, it is imperative that the concerns, opinions, and frankly the will of residents be made known. TC is inviting public comment at the budget meetings.