Post by novillero on Feb 29, 2008 10:39:19 GMT -5
THis story does not deal directly with the boro, and we are not within the parameters set up by Corzine, but the larger question looms of whether merger is good for the boro.
[glow=red,2,300]TRENTON BUDGET CUTS THREATEN A WAY OF LIFE[/glow]
Branchville, others may have to merge
Friday, February 29, 2008
BY ROBERT SCHWANEBERG AND MIKE FRASSINELLI
Star-Ledger Staff
Everybody in Branchville Borough is on a first-name basis: Joe the Barber, Tom the Mechanic, Dee the Diner Lady. This half- square-mile hamlet of 841 souls in Sussex County may be small, but it is proud.
"We have a post office, clothing store, bank, barber shop, deli, pizza shop, restaurant, drugstore," said Joe the Barber, whose last name is Accetta. "The senior citizens, if they can park in the center, can walk and do most of their business."
"There's not too many towns set up like this," Accetta continued, looking out the window of Johnny's Barber Shop toward the five-pointed intersection where everything comes together. "It's kind of unique."
It is certainly unusual. Residents pay property taxes for schools and county services but nothing to support municipal government, thanks to free State Police protection and $918,059 in state aid -- more than $1,000 for every resident.
And it is endangered. Branchville's municipal finances are about to collide with Gov. Jon Corzine's plan to balance the state budget and encourage -- some would say coerce -- small towns to merge. The governor wants to end free State Police patrols and halve or eliminate a particular category of state aid for Branchville and 322 other towns with populations under 10,000.
When the Department of Community Affairs posts new state aid figures Monday, Branchville stands to lose $878,838, or more than two- thirds of its municipal budget.
Branchville Council President William Bathgate, whose family has been in the region for five generations, doubts his town could survive the loss.
"I think it would run us right out," Bathgate said. "I think they are basically trying to tell everybody: 'You've got to merge.' That would be a whole new scenario for the little town of Branchville, I'll tell you."
Across the state, mayors have reacted to Corzine's proposal with "absolute outrage," according to William Dressel, executive director of the New Jersey State League of Municipalities.
"It's going to be incredible sticker shock for the residents and taxpayers of those municipalities that have received these monies on the basis of need," Dressel said.
"They should have seen this coming," said Community Affairs Commissioner Joseph Doria. "At the legislative level, this has been discussed for many years."
For decades, state leaders have been prescribing consolidation of New Jersey's 566 municipalities as a cure for spiraling property taxes. Govs. Jim Florio, Christie Whitman and Jim McGreevey all talked about it. In 1998, former Assembly Speaker Alan Karcher published a book titled "New Jersey's Multiple Municipal Madness."
But earlier programs relied mainly on carrots: state grants to encourage towns to merge or share services. Corzine is the first to swing a big stick by following Karcher's advice to cut off state aid to the smallest towns.
"Staying where we are, with the most units of government per capita of any place in the country, doesn't strike me as a long-run way to continue to have efficiency, and it doesn't lead to lower costs," Cor zine said Wednesday.
Branchville will be particularly hard-hit. Thanks to a quirk of law and geography -- it is home to Se lective Insurance Group -- it has long enjoyed enviable revenues through what used to be called the domestic insurance premiums tax, which brought it $750,000 in 1994.
But the following year, that program was folded into Consolidated Municipal Property Tax Relief Aid, which Corzine's proposed budget cuts by $62 million. It would still distribute $773 million in state aid, but towns with populations under 10,000 would see their grants halved and those under 5,000 would lose them entirely. Branch ville would lose $860,835 -- plus another $18,003 from the municipal property tax assistance program, which Corzine plans to eliminate statewide for a savings of $32.6 million.
With no schools, police force or library, Branchville lacks many functions of a typical municipality. Its $1.27 million municipal budget supports two full-time road workers and a score of part-timers, many of whom wear multiple hats.
Municipal Clerk Kathryn Leissler counts among her 11 titles deputy tax collector, registrar, resource manager and welfare liaison -- not that anyone is on welfare. The borough hall is open from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Branchville is surrounded by Frankford Township -- population 5,680 and 34 square miles -- and pays to send its students to schools there. But merging with its neighbor is unappealing to many Branchville residents.
"Things could change dramatically," said Bathgate. He worries about "some of the far-out ideas that people bring with them for the little town of Branchville."
Chief Financial Officer Jessica Caruso said, "A lot of Branchville's population is seniors, and they do appreciate the small-town feel."
Then there are property taxes. In Branchville, thanks largely to all that state aid, they average $4,018 -- nearly $2,500 below the statewide average. Wayne Orr said he worries that merging with Frankford, where property taxes are higher at $4,724, will push them up for Branchville homeowners.
Orr, who has a Santa Claus beard, runs Orr's clothing store, founded in 1898, the same year Branchville was incorporated. On the wall hang a deer head and a painting of John Wayne; out back there is an outhouse. Bathgate, 71, remembers a time when "everybody had an outhouse."
Orr has little faith in the politicians in Trenton.
"They really and truly don't know what they're doing if they're in this much debt," he said.
But there is optimism in town that, one way or another, Branch ville will endure.
"We're survivors. We'd find a way," said Caruso, the finance officer. She recalled other threats to regionalize and end free State Police patrols that evaporated.
Assemblyman John Burzichelli (D-Gloucester), who sits on the budget committee, vowed to work to restore aid to small towns -- at least for the near future.
"If we're going to do this, set a timetable," said Burzichelli, who is mayor of Paulsboro (population 6,160) and represents 36 municipalities that stand to lose state aid. He suggested giving small towns five year's notice that they must merge or forfeit state assistance.
But regardless of whether his town is merged or renamed, Orr said, the people who live there will hang on to their identity.
"We're still going to be Branch ville," he said.
Staff writers Claire Heininger, Tom Hester and Dunstan McNichol contributed to this report.
www.nj.com/news/ledger/index.ssf?/base/news-13/120426338837660.xml&coll=1
[glow=red,2,300]TRENTON BUDGET CUTS THREATEN A WAY OF LIFE[/glow]
Branchville, others may have to merge
Friday, February 29, 2008
BY ROBERT SCHWANEBERG AND MIKE FRASSINELLI
Star-Ledger Staff
Everybody in Branchville Borough is on a first-name basis: Joe the Barber, Tom the Mechanic, Dee the Diner Lady. This half- square-mile hamlet of 841 souls in Sussex County may be small, but it is proud.
"We have a post office, clothing store, bank, barber shop, deli, pizza shop, restaurant, drugstore," said Joe the Barber, whose last name is Accetta. "The senior citizens, if they can park in the center, can walk and do most of their business."
"There's not too many towns set up like this," Accetta continued, looking out the window of Johnny's Barber Shop toward the five-pointed intersection where everything comes together. "It's kind of unique."
It is certainly unusual. Residents pay property taxes for schools and county services but nothing to support municipal government, thanks to free State Police protection and $918,059 in state aid -- more than $1,000 for every resident.
And it is endangered. Branchville's municipal finances are about to collide with Gov. Jon Corzine's plan to balance the state budget and encourage -- some would say coerce -- small towns to merge. The governor wants to end free State Police patrols and halve or eliminate a particular category of state aid for Branchville and 322 other towns with populations under 10,000.
When the Department of Community Affairs posts new state aid figures Monday, Branchville stands to lose $878,838, or more than two- thirds of its municipal budget.
Branchville Council President William Bathgate, whose family has been in the region for five generations, doubts his town could survive the loss.
"I think it would run us right out," Bathgate said. "I think they are basically trying to tell everybody: 'You've got to merge.' That would be a whole new scenario for the little town of Branchville, I'll tell you."
Across the state, mayors have reacted to Corzine's proposal with "absolute outrage," according to William Dressel, executive director of the New Jersey State League of Municipalities.
"It's going to be incredible sticker shock for the residents and taxpayers of those municipalities that have received these monies on the basis of need," Dressel said.
"They should have seen this coming," said Community Affairs Commissioner Joseph Doria. "At the legislative level, this has been discussed for many years."
For decades, state leaders have been prescribing consolidation of New Jersey's 566 municipalities as a cure for spiraling property taxes. Govs. Jim Florio, Christie Whitman and Jim McGreevey all talked about it. In 1998, former Assembly Speaker Alan Karcher published a book titled "New Jersey's Multiple Municipal Madness."
But earlier programs relied mainly on carrots: state grants to encourage towns to merge or share services. Corzine is the first to swing a big stick by following Karcher's advice to cut off state aid to the smallest towns.
"Staying where we are, with the most units of government per capita of any place in the country, doesn't strike me as a long-run way to continue to have efficiency, and it doesn't lead to lower costs," Cor zine said Wednesday.
Branchville will be particularly hard-hit. Thanks to a quirk of law and geography -- it is home to Se lective Insurance Group -- it has long enjoyed enviable revenues through what used to be called the domestic insurance premiums tax, which brought it $750,000 in 1994.
But the following year, that program was folded into Consolidated Municipal Property Tax Relief Aid, which Corzine's proposed budget cuts by $62 million. It would still distribute $773 million in state aid, but towns with populations under 10,000 would see their grants halved and those under 5,000 would lose them entirely. Branch ville would lose $860,835 -- plus another $18,003 from the municipal property tax assistance program, which Corzine plans to eliminate statewide for a savings of $32.6 million.
With no schools, police force or library, Branchville lacks many functions of a typical municipality. Its $1.27 million municipal budget supports two full-time road workers and a score of part-timers, many of whom wear multiple hats.
Municipal Clerk Kathryn Leissler counts among her 11 titles deputy tax collector, registrar, resource manager and welfare liaison -- not that anyone is on welfare. The borough hall is open from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Branchville is surrounded by Frankford Township -- population 5,680 and 34 square miles -- and pays to send its students to schools there. But merging with its neighbor is unappealing to many Branchville residents.
"Things could change dramatically," said Bathgate. He worries about "some of the far-out ideas that people bring with them for the little town of Branchville."
Chief Financial Officer Jessica Caruso said, "A lot of Branchville's population is seniors, and they do appreciate the small-town feel."
Then there are property taxes. In Branchville, thanks largely to all that state aid, they average $4,018 -- nearly $2,500 below the statewide average. Wayne Orr said he worries that merging with Frankford, where property taxes are higher at $4,724, will push them up for Branchville homeowners.
Orr, who has a Santa Claus beard, runs Orr's clothing store, founded in 1898, the same year Branchville was incorporated. On the wall hang a deer head and a painting of John Wayne; out back there is an outhouse. Bathgate, 71, remembers a time when "everybody had an outhouse."
Orr has little faith in the politicians in Trenton.
"They really and truly don't know what they're doing if they're in this much debt," he said.
But there is optimism in town that, one way or another, Branch ville will endure.
"We're survivors. We'd find a way," said Caruso, the finance officer. She recalled other threats to regionalize and end free State Police patrols that evaporated.
Assemblyman John Burzichelli (D-Gloucester), who sits on the budget committee, vowed to work to restore aid to small towns -- at least for the near future.
"If we're going to do this, set a timetable," said Burzichelli, who is mayor of Paulsboro (population 6,160) and represents 36 municipalities that stand to lose state aid. He suggested giving small towns five year's notice that they must merge or forfeit state assistance.
But regardless of whether his town is merged or renamed, Orr said, the people who live there will hang on to their identity.
"We're still going to be Branch ville," he said.
Staff writers Claire Heininger, Tom Hester and Dunstan McNichol contributed to this report.
www.nj.com/news/ledger/index.ssf?/base/news-13/120426338837660.xml&coll=1
