Bridgewater’s Budgets

During my Thanksgiving holiday visit to Potomac, MD with family and friends, it was hard not to think of the fiscal and monetary debacle at the Federal and State levels and of its relationship to local expenditures here in Bridgewater. Soon, we are going to find out how reduced state support and spending patterns of the past may come to haunt us in municipal and school tax increases.

BRIDGEWATER-RARITAN SCHOOL DISTRICT. No numbers have yet been released, but a board committee and administrators have put a ‘preliminary’ budget together and already have a good idea of the magnitude of next year’s school budget.

On December 16th, the Bridgewater-Raritan Board of Education will have its first public review of the 2009-2010 budget at the Wade Building in Martinsville at 8:00 pm. I doubt that Bridgewater and Raritan will be presented with a zero-based, hold-the-line proposal. But we can dream.

Thoughts for the Board: If you present an increase in the budget, please don’t tell the public that it’s for the kids. Worse, don’t use the worn-out rationale that the largest percentage of the budget is for salaries and that, therefore, there is nothing you can do about it because that’s a fixed cost. Remember, you are the same board that, on a wintry December 2007 evening, voted without meaningful debate for a 12.8% three-year wage package hike.

BRIDGEWATER TOWNSHIP. What surprised me about the status of the municipal budget came in today’s Courier-News editorial suggesting that there may not be sufficient involvement in budget development between the mayor’s office and the council. In the past, there was a long history of a sometimes adversarial relationship between former Democrat Mayor James Dowden and the Republican Township Council.

But what would be the excuse for anything but an ongoing and transparent working relationship between Mayor Flannery and the Township Council? Township management is now 100% under Republican control. Both the Major’s office and the Council should be working closely to develop Bridgewater’s budget. These are dreadful economic times demanding nothing less.

SUMMARY. I’m very concerned that both our municipal and school elected officials recognize the enormous power of taxation at their fingertips, yet may not admit that this deflating economic situation requires strong measures to keep one of the country’s highest real estate taxes under control. We can’t keep expecting that major corporate headquarters, national retail outlets, and other businesses located in Bridgewater and Raritan will keep acting as a counter-weight to our over-taxed communities.

One of the ironies in this process is that steep national and local declines in newspaper circulation have so savaged newsroom personnel that the dedicated, on-site reporter doing meeting-to-meeting coverage has had to take a back seat to the economic realities of the newspaper business. We all pay for that with less information and, therefore, with less influence.