By JACQUELINE DURETT
Correspondent
SOUTH AMBOY — It was all smiles at the March 2 City Council business meeting.
The reason? An unexpected surplus of city funds totaling nearly $1.5 million. That news should also make taxpayers smile, since some of that money will be used to reduce this year’s tax increase.
Mayor Fred Henry told the council at the meeting that the budget is nearly complete, and if the budget moves ahead as is, the tax rate would be going up one cent.
If the budget remains as is and is approved by the council, the tax rate per $100 assessed value would rise from $1.158 to $1.168. That translates to an increase of $26.60 annually on the average assessed home in the city of $266,000.
Business Administrator Camille Tooker echoed Henry’s enthusiasm, adding that the healthy condition of the 2016 budget is from years of responsible planning.
Henry explained that while preparing the budget, officials realized that what was originally looking like a $200,000 or $300,000 surplus was actually more than a million.
The surplus derives from a few different sources, Henry and Tooker said, including a change in health insurance plans for city employees, $200,000 in reimbursement from the Federal Emergency Management Agency from Superstorm Sandy, and an increase of about $50 million in the net worth of the city. According to Tooker, the city’s worth currently stands at $906 million.
“That’s a nice leap for us,” Tooker said, adding that the projects the city has in the pipeline should cause that number to continue to grow.
“This is wonderful news for the city,” she said. “The bottom line is that the city is in a much healthier fiscal position,” than it has been in years past. She said the surplus at the end of 2014 was about $640,000.
She said the 2016 budget maintains city services, retains the free summer recreation program, enables the city to purchase the GovPilot web-based municipal administration system, grants the library’s request for a budget increase and provides for the city to hire a full-time mechanic.
Explaining the need for a mechanic, Tooker explained that South Amboy currently uses part-time mechanics who come in after 4 p.m., which can be problematic when officials need car and truck repairs done quickly.
“It’s a waiting game,” she said.
Henry said in the past, the budget on occasion wasn’t funded the way he would have liked with one-shot business deals. The current state of things puts the city in a much more stable position. The city’s healthy fiscal shape should also be reflected in South Amboy’s future bond rating, which would save the city money should it need to borrow.
Tooker said the mayor and council are to be commended for putting the processes and changes in place that led to the surplus.
“Now we’re seeing the result for what you’ve all being working for the past many years,” she said.
