Budgeting in the Booths

Municipal budget season can be a blur of charts and buzzwords, budget meetings and public hearings as township officials hash out the problems of today and the next year.

Sometimes, though, the process isn’t so formal.

Sometimes, it turns out, you come up with solutions to those budget problems on the back of a diner place mat.

With rain thrumming on the roof of the Colonial Diner and lightning flashing against the windows looking out on to Broad Street, that’s what West Deptford committee members Len Daws and Sean Kilpatrick did Wednesday night, sketching graphs and jotting numbers as they talked for several hours.

The two men kicked around ideas through the evening, everything from ways to bring new businesses to the township, to planning for potential retirements in the next two years, to looking into whether the township will have to repaint the massive water tower off Jessup Road.

They kept coming back to one point, though: a $3.1 million jump in debt service payments that will hit in 2012–a jump that means a 40-cent increase in the local tax rate, if the township can’t find new tax revenue and further savings.

“It’s not something we can wait until January to address,” Dawgs said. “We can’t get out of budget mode after introducing this year’s budget (on April 7).”

While some of the savings the two talked about–everything from reduced costs in salary and benefits via attrition, to making the township more energy-efficient–can put a dent in that number, both Daws and Kilpatrick were focused on increasing tax revenue over the long-term.

Daws noted that tax revenue from ratables–which make up about half the township’s income–has gone up steadily over the past several years, and some of the vacancies in places like the Mid-Atlantic Corporate Center–including the addition of SSM Industries at the end of 2010–are starting to fill up.

Kilpatrick tossed in the idea of creating an aggressive incentive program to try to fill out the remaining vacancies, saying the key to increasing tax revenues is increasing the number of businesses.

“That’ll really help the homeowners,” he said.

Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILOT) programs to entice businesses are another possibility, Daws said, in any spots that have been unoccupied for at least five years. The township’s struck such deals with some of the solar projects currently underway, and planned one with LS Power’s natural gas-fired power plant, which is now in doubt, pending a decision from the state Board of Public Utilities.

“That could be a blow to the town,” Daws said.

Ultimately, it comes down to try to minimize the effect on the tax bill, Kilpatrick said. Daws noted that, while 78 percent of property owners in the township saw their tax bill go down or stay neutral under the revaluation, 22 percent saw an increase–and that 22 percent is what they’re keeping in mind, especially given the $3.1 million jump next year.

“We’re optimistic we can get through this year’s budget process fairly easily, but next year is the big issue,” Daws said.