$490,000 in Two Years to "Update" the Master Plan?

Is it just me or does this Master Plan update seem like it's getting a little financially "excessive"?

Here are the facts. In May 2010, our committee passed a resolution to appropriate $250,000 of "emergency" money to update the Master Plan. All five committee people voted in favor of spending the money. Reading this bill list is very interesting. It seems that in June 2010, a month after the emergency funds were passed, we started cutting checks to Birdsall for work that was done in 2008-2009. Such as the natural resources inventory to the tune of $19,000 and reinstating a coastal center (whatever that is) for $56,531. What is amazing is that Birdsall did $152,877 worth of work for two years and did not get paid until the "emergency" money was passed. Why wasn't he paid for all of that work as he did it? Check out the bill list from Dec 2010, the town (the taxpayers) wrote him a nice check for almost $78,000 on Dec. 31. 

Did the committee ask all the necessary questions about this study? Did anyone ask if Birdsall could do it for less? So now he says he needs $190,000 more? For what? That is a total of $440,000 in two years. Figuring at $120.00 an hour for our engineer's time, that comes out to 3,660 man hours. Is that possible? Is this how business is done in our town?

I hope that on the second reading of this resolution at the Dec. 5 meeting, one of our "full-time" committeemen will ask this question or at least get a detailed explanation from Mr. Hess about why we need $190,000 more. Maybe that's how it goes here in Barnegat, we will just accept it. I have included copies of the bill lists for you to see where the money went. It is really amazing! Endless money!

The bill lists are in chronological order starting with June, the month after "emergency" Ordinance 2010-07 was passed.

If the images are too small here, you can go to www.letstalkbarnegat.com, they are a little larger there. Hey, like I said in the beginning, maybe it's just me!