Red Bank’s municipal budget for the coming fiscal year sailed to approval Monday night despite the misgivings of several residents.
Kim Senkeleski of John Street questioned increases in salary and health insurance costs. Harrison Avenue’s Jim Willis bemoaned the “increasing cynicism” he said
he detects among his East Side neighbors about local government. And Stephen Hecht of Branch Avenue took aim at tax-appeal settlements, which he suggested were eroding collections.
Senkeleski focused on two-year increases for salaries and health insurance, which she said rose $240,000 and $275,000, respectively.
“That’s a lot of money in two years,” she said.
Willis told the council he wasn’t opposed to tax increases in all
cases, but said paying more for salaries and health benefits did
nothing to improve the quality of life for residents.
“It’s hard to feel excited about living in a place when you don’t
feel your elected officials are really mindful of that,” he said.
Disclosure: Willis, a social networking computer specialist, provides tech services to redbankgreen.
In response, Mayor Pasquale Menna said the salary increase reflected 3.5-percent across-the-board increases given last year to all borough employees after that benchmark was established in negotiations with the town’s two unions, representing the police and public works employees.
But now that the borough has instituted a merit system for non-union workers, they will no longer get across-the-board increases, he said. “That will not happen this year,” he said.
Menna also said a two-percent increase for salaries in the budget was a placeholder figure, and that the actual increase would be driven by the outcome of ongoing union negotiations.
Councilman Mike DuPont, who steered the budget process as the head of the council’s finance committee, added that the spending plan shows a reduction in operating expenses of $170,000 from last year, and more savings are expected from measures such as contracting for health-related services with Monmouth County and putting borough employees on a four-day workweek beginning June 1.
“We have heard your cries,” DuPont said. “We are trying to control the costs.”
Borough CFO Frank Mason told Senkeleski that while insurance costs keep rising, the town’s participation in a joint insurance fund had limited this year’s premium increase to five percent, “the low end in recent years.”
Moreover, that figure did not reflect a $162,000 dividend the town got from the fund last year based on its claims experience.
“I have a big blow-up of that check in my office,” Mason said. “I look at it every day.”
Borough officials disagreed with Hecht regarding the significance of the impact of tax appeal settlements.
But a half-dozen such settlements that had been scheduled for a vote were tabled so that more information could be provided to the council about the corporations and the individuals involved. The issue arose after DuPont said that, absent such information, he was unable to determine if voting would put him in a conflict of interest position.
The budget was passed unanimously by the all-Democratic council.
The $19.4 million spending plan calls for $10.9 million to be raised by
property taxes, and would increase the local portion of the tax rate —
excluding local school taxes and
the Monmouth County levy — to 47.8 cents per $100 of assessed
property value, up from 44.5 cents in the current year.
The
effect on the owner of a home assessed at the average $407,000 would be
an increase of $134 for the year, or three-quarters of one percent.
Here’s the detailed budget: Download Budget_introduced_2009. And here’s a summary: Download 2009_Budget_Summary.
