High Union County Taxes Irk Local Officials

It seems more than one local municipality is tired of high tax increases from Union County.

At a June 22 New Providence Borough Council meeting, Council President Michael Gennaro said residents will pay an additional $745,394 in taxes to the county this year, which represents a 6.39 percent increase over 2012. 

To put this increase into perspective, Gennaro noted that the municipal tax — which represents 21.6 percent of the total tax bill — increased $157,785, or 1.29 percent.

“That sounds pretty good but I think we’re in competition with the schools now because when you look at the schools, who represent 56.8 percent of the budget, their increase was $351,867, which represented only 1.09 percent increase last year,” Gennaro said.

Gennaro says the county should re-evaluate their expenditures going into the next year.

“The county, I would hope, is going to take a very, very hard look at expenditures in 2014 because no community can continue to absorb a 6.4 percent increase year over year,” Gennaro said. “It’s not right and I hope it’s not repeated next year.”

Summit Common Council also brought up the county’s high taxes at a recent meeting and even passed a resolution that supports Assemblywoman Nancy Muñoz's bill to establish a commission to study the effectiveness of county government.

At the July 23 meeting, Summit Councilman Dave Bomgaars said 26 percent of Summit’s annual tax bill goes to Union County, taxes have increased 5 percent annually and the county is not being fiscally responsible.  

“We represent 4 percent of the population and we’re paying 11 percent of their budget,” Bomgaars said. 

Summit Common Council members say this assembly bill was originally introduced by Assemblyman Eric Muñoz, M. D., the Assemblywoman's late husband.

Councilman Patrick Hurley said he thinks this resolution is a good start and he respects Munoz’s efforts. However, he wishes it had “more teeth to it” and says Summit needs to get more aggressive with this issue.

“No one is willing to tackle it and I think now we really need to tackle it because the county taxes are strangling us. We’ve done our job and kept things flat. The Board of Education has done their job. The county basically is sticking it in our face time and time again in two ways,” Hurley said. “One is excessive spending on stuff that is just ridiculous and then we have this re-distribution formula, which isn’t right for Summit.”

To put things into perspective, Hurley used Elizabeth as an example, which has 125,000 residents and pays around 33 million in taxes to the county each year. Summit has about 22,000 residents and pays 36 million to the county annually. 

“County government does work in some areas, but it doesn’t work for us,” Hurley said. “Union county doesn’t work for us.” 

Hurley noted that Berkeley Heights Council recently passed a resolution that will place a referendum question on the November ballot, asking residents if the town should try to secede from Union County and join Morris County, and Hurley thinks Summit should do the same.

“We’ve got to get a heck of a lot more aggressive on this or some council 10 years from now is going to be debating the same thing,” he said.

In late June, Berkeley Heights Council did pass its resolution to place the secession question on the ballot, an idea Mayor Joe Bruno and council members have discussed for nearly a year.

The mayor says fiscal mismanagement by Union County's Board of Freeholders has led to higher taxes—a $1.2 million increase hit Berkeley Heights in May—and reduced services for residents.

Bruno says the idea of seceding from Union County is his “attempt to say ‘enough is enough.’” 

A move to Morris County would save Berkeley Heights taxpayers $7 million per year.

Bruno did acknowledge that it would be difficult to make the jump across the river, and would require residents to believe in it and get behind it.

If township residents vote to move forward with the secession, Morris County and the State of New Jersey will ultimately have a say in the final decision.