PRINCETON: Council once again expected to approve $61.9 million budget

By Philip Sean Curran, Staff Writer
The Princeton Council is scheduled to adopt a $61.9 million municipal budget at its meeting Monday night.
“We’ve had a pretty vigorous discussion this year on the budget. And I think that’s a result of us really coming to terms with the fact that there’s no magic bullet,” Mayor Liz Lempert told reporters at her pre-meeting press conference in the afternoon. “We’re trying to exercise fiscal discipline in a way where we’re not looking just at this year’s budget but looking at the impacts of decisions this year for future years and working to balance competing priorities.”
“We’re not Atlantic City,” Council President Lance Liverman said of the fiscally troubled resort town, at the press conference.
The town has pointed to increases this year in pension and health insurance costs, even as other revenues have been flat. The town has shelved plans to raise taxes by an additional $150,000 to put that money toward the surplus account. Mayor Lempert said that is “off the table” because an equal amount of spending cuts had been identified.