Board of Trustees Discuss Budget, Non-Profit Funding

On Monday, the South Orange Board of Trustees were presented with the projected budget for 2011, a budget which included a $2 million surplus and cuts in spending for non-profit groups.  The budget, prepared by Village Administrator John Gross, showed a tax increase of 2% for 2011, roughly the same increase as was implemented in 2010.

Among the top discussions for the board was the tax rate increase.  Some trustees favored a 0% increase for this year, keeping the current tax rate as is for the immediate future, and having a “wait and see” approach for 2012.  Others favored the projected 2% tax rate which would increase taxes for this year, but help ease the burden for next year. 

Trustee Michael Goldberg stated that he “could not support a 2% tax.”  His suggestion was to “utilize the surplus now,” leaving little, if any, to impact next year’s budget.  Trustee Deborah Davis Ford disagreed, feeling that using the entire surplus this year would negatively affect the town’s financial stability in the future.

“The feel good thing and easy thing to do is to use it all now,” said Davis Ford.  “But then we have greater challenges in (20)12 and (20)13.  That makes absolutely no sense to me.”

Village President Alex Torpey weighed in with skepticism about using the surplus, feeling that “the more medium and long term focus put in the process, the better.”

“I think the fact that we even have a surplus that we might be potentially able to use if something happened next year, that we could not predict this year is a good position to be in,” said Torpey.  “I’d just be hesitant and worried about putting that in jeopardy.”

Trustee Janine Bauer asked for more options, feeling that the projected budget was a “status-quo budget.”  She asked for different scenarios to be presented with different tax rate increases.  She asked what cuts would be made if the tax increase rate was lowered without depleting the surplus.  Gross agreed to come back with a new budget proposal, but not before warning that it would be filled with cuts.

“It’s going to be a red-line budget,” said Gross.  “There’s going to be a lot of things that are cut.”

Among the cuts could be certain programs and also projects that have been funded, but not yet started.  Gross warned that he would write up the list, but that there “will be individual pain."

The other main topic of discussion revolved around non-profit organizations and the Community Coalition of Race (CCR) in general.  New Jersey law requires non-profits to be entered into a service agreement with the town if it is to receive municipal funding.  While various non-profits such as Youth Net, SOPAC and Main Street South Orange are in such contracts, CCR is not.

Currently, CCR receives $22,500 in Village funding.  A straw poll was taken with the majority of trustees voting to eliminate the funding, though a few had certain conditions that had to be met.  Despite the loss of funding, there is currently a proposal on the table for CCR to move into Baird and receive “in-kind” services from the Village.  That would include office space, telephone service and IT services.

Village President Torpey stressed that the defunding should not be taken as a lack of confidence in the services provided by CCR, but rather as the town complying with state law.  He also hoped that there was better communication to the non-profit organizations about why these cuts are being made.

“I just want to make sure that we are doing everything we can that if we are cutting funding, it’s done in a way that doesn’t restrict or inhibit the ability for these organizations to operate,” said Torpey.

Other budget items discussed were a cut in funding to SOPAC, whether landlords could begin passing fee obligations to tenants and whether a shared library service with Maplewood was feasible.