Proposed tax hike outrages Orange

Facing 18.6% jump, residents sound off

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

BY KEVIN C. DILWORTH

Star-Ledger Staff

Angered they might get slapped with an 18.6 percent property tax hike, Orange residents and business owners packed a city council meeting and threatened everything from a taxpayer revolt to street demonstrations if a financial crisis is not averted.

Monday's council meeting ended early yesterday morning with some elected officials pledging to seek solutions to decrease the anticipated tax hike -- largely fueled by a $5.6 million rise in city operating costs, stalled redevelopment efforts and a $1.6 million jump in municipal indebtedness.

"Two years ago, the largest increase in Orange's history was levied," Heywood Avenue resident Patricia Weston Rivera told the council. "Property owners saw increases as large as 100 percent. A revolt occurred. Then we began to see the aftermath, our own Hurricane Orange.

"For sale signs sprouted up all over," said Rivera, adding housing foreclosures are up in the 2.2-square-mile city. "The high taxes means no one will buy. We are an urban city with a weak school system and high taxes. What kind of bargain is this?

"We can no longer afford to keep our homes -- skyrocketing gas and oil prices means we choose to be cold in our homes or put gas in our cars," Rivera told the council at a public hearing on the $57 million city budget. "We can't refinance our way out of this, because our homes have lost have t heir equity."

Yet, "we see business as usual at town hall," said Rivera, as many in the standing-room-only audience nodded in agreement. "Spending appears to be rampant. There are new hires this year, in this economy. Spending plans are envisioned without any clear cut way to get money for these plans, other than the taxpayers."

Rivera, who questioned the proposed $35.9 million municipal tax levy, was joined by others, including former South Ward councilman William R. Lewis, Epstein's hardware businessman Jeffrey Feld, and residents Linda Jones Bell, Michael O'Malley, R.A. Booker, Loretta Creggett, Joseph Hoffman, Frederick Lester, Catherine Reddick, Keith Speegle, Heather Parke, Murphy Wilson and Leroy Stafford.

"The 18 percent tax increase in the introduced budget reflects the condition of Orange that my administration inherited from past administrations," Mayor Eldridge Hawkins Jr., the city's mayor since July 1, said in response to criticism. "We intend to work diligently with the council, the Citizens Budget Advisory Committee and others to reduce the increase."

The mayor added, "Before we finished the work we began in July, of finding cuts that would do the least harm, we were forced to introduce the budget because of a legal requirement needed to apply for more state aid to help taxpayers."

Jack Kelly, Orange's chief financial officer, filed in September a last-minute state extraordinary aid request to the state Depart ment of Community Affairs in Trenton.
The application was for $4.1 million -- $3.1 million more than Orange was awarded a year ago and before the state's current budget woes.

Hawkins' comments marked the first official budget message the new mayor has made since he handed the 2008-09 spending plan to the council on Sept. 16. The panel then introduced the spending plan that calls for increasing the municipal levy from $30.6 million to $35.9 million.

As it now stands, an Orange taxpayer with a home assessed at the city's average of $246,700 would see municipal taxes increase by $904.

The size of the hike is enough to encourage "rioting in the streets," Wilson said.

Feld, the Main Street businessman, accused Hawkins -- who won the part-time mayoral post that pays $25,000 a year -- of making a political "breach of contract."

Hawkins has failed to carry out his mayoral campaign promises to stabilize taxes, get rid of government waste and freeze all municipal hirings, Feld said.

O'Malley, an Irving Terrace resident, complained about some Orange elected officials "double dipping," securing two or more paid municipal jobs.

Creggett, a Tremont Place resident, pleaded with Orange's elected officials to help put an end to what she described as an "economic crisis" that is financially crippling everyone.

"We can't handle this," Creggett said. "How much do you wan t us to bear? We can't sell our homes because people run when they see our taxes." Residents simply "can't be the first and last solution" to Orange's municipal budgetary problems, Creggett said. "We need a relief plan."

Hawkins may have run his 2008 mayoral campaign on promises of political transparency and change, but "we are not seeing change," Creggett added.

If the introduced budget remains unchanged, "this really will be the nail in the coffin" for Orange, said Parke, a Tremont Avenue homeowner. "I urge you to find a way to lower it. If we are forced out of (our homes), nothing good can come of it."

Hawkins said he, other elected officials and the budget committee will continue to refine the introduced spending plan until word is received on how much, if any, state extraordinary aid might be pumped into Orange's municipal coffers.

"While we must consider making some reductions in costs and services, we do not have to do so in a manner that is arbitrary or uncoordinated," Hawkins said in budget message distributed to the public Monday night. "I have asked each department to review and rethink their mission statements, and formulate a list of goals for delivering services with less costs in the coming year."

Kevin C. Dilworth may be reached at kdilworth@starledger.com or (973) 392-4143.