Hoffman Proud of Responsible Fiscal Stewardship

As Chair of the Borough’s Budget & Finance Committee, I’ve worked with my colleagues and Borough administration to manage the Borough’s finances in a fiscally prudent manner while delivering quality municipal services our residents deserve. In my next term, I pledge to build on a record of outstanding fiscal stewardship that has kept our credit exceptionally strong, property tax rate stable, debt burden manageable, fund balances growing, and our infrastructure in top-notch condition. I commit to adhere to our established Long-Range Financial Management Plan, which serves as a blueprint for diversifying revenues and controlling expenses. This plan has produced stellar results for a Chatham, a small town with an overwhelmingly residential ratable base.

Despite incredible headwinds created by perpetually flat “state aid”, rising contractual labor expenses, and unfunded state mandates and pension obligations, the Borough’s financial condition has remained sound on my watch. In late August, Moody’s affirmed Chatham Borough’s Aaa credit rating, pointing to an “extremely strong” credit position and citing “a robust financial position”, “healthy tax base”, and “exceptionally light debt burden”. In fact, Moody’s pointed out that the Borough’s Aaa rating “far exceeds” the median Aa3 credit rating of US cities overall.

All of Chatham’s residents should be extremely proud of this incredible accomplishment. A ‘Aaa’ credit rating has a direct impact on the Borough’s ability to access the bond market to fund our capital program at favorable interest rates. On an annual basis, this results in thousands in interest savings to Borough taxpayers.

So how have we accomplished this?

• Holding the line on operating expenses through the sharing of services and keeping our workforce lean. Since 2010, the Borough’s budget has risen a total of 5% (only .625% annually), while our municipal workforce has been right-sized over that same period through inter-local cooperation with neighboring municipalities.

• Managing employee healthcare costs by moving to the NJ State Health Benefit Plan and shifting a greater share of insurance premiums to employees. The Borough realized a 0% increase in employee health insurance rates in 2018.

• Diversifying revenue streams to lessen reliance on property taxes. By endorsing a user fee model for many services, continuing to meter water & sewer usage, maintaining parking fees competitive with and in many cases lower than surrounding towns, and leasing Borough-owned assets to credit-worthy tenants, we have reduced the percentage of our budget funded by property taxes over time to only 60%, which is the 2^nd lowest reliance on property taxes among our neighboring towns.

• Normalizing capital expenditures at roughly $1.0 million a year to eliminate wild swings in bonding, keep our debt burden manageable and debt service stable and predictable.

Through uncompromising discipline, we have shunned a harmful “max the tax” philosophy, but instead have held increases in the Borough’s tax levy to under 1.0% annually in all three years of my term, without relying on one-shot gimmicks and egregious loopholes in the cap rules allowed by Trenton, including tapping banked cap. As a result, the portion of each tax dollar attributable to the Borough has declined over the past three years from 22% to only 19% this year.

A fiscally conservative approach which balances the need to maintain essential services at a reasonable cost has worked well for Chatham Borough’s residents. If re-elected, I intend to stay the course while identifying new opportunities to reduce costs and increase ratables through targeted redevelopment opportunities.