FREEHOLD – On Sept. 11, residents of Freehold Borough will have an opportunity to discuss and decide which projects they want to receive municipal funding.
The meeting will be held in Borough Hall, 51 W. Main St., at 7 p.m. It is part of a participatory budgeting project which will allow residents to decide how $200,000 from the 2017 municipal budget will be spent. The allocation of the $200,000 will be determined by the number of votes each project receives, according to municipal officials.
Projects that will appear on the ballot are a fisherman’s dock for Lake Topanemus, proposed by the Lake Topanemus Commission; a free public wi-fi system in the downtown district, proposed by Downtown Freehold; additional street lighting, also proposed by Downtown Freehold; and “Welcome to Freehold” signs, proposed by businessman Carl Steinberg.
Councilman Ron Griffiths said representatives of those projects will explain their projects to the public during the meeting.
Voting on the projects will begin at the conclusion of the meeting and take place from Sept. 11-17. Eligible voters will have the option of using a paper ballot or voting online at www.freeholdboroughnj.gov, according to Griffiths.
All residents age 14 and older will be eligible to vote on the projects. Business owners, even if they are not Freehold Borough residents, will also be eligible to vote because Griffiths said they are considered to be major stakeholders in the community.
Borough officials have emphasized that the participatory budgeting project will not increase taxes or the total municipal budget; the $200,000 that will be spent at the direction of voters will come from the budget that was adopted by the Borough Council this year.
“The amount represents only slightly more than 1 percent of the total [$16.4 million] budget, but it also represents our trust in the public and our desire to engage them in the democratic process,” Griffiths said. “We want people who have never voted before to realize their vote does count and their voice is being heard.”
