Courier Editorial - January 3, 2008

M'town's GOP should work toward tax cuts in '08

word from the Publisher

By JIM PURCELL

    Last week, The Courier covered Middletown Committeeman Patrick Short, when he vowed not to vote for a tax increase in Middletown during 2008.
    Mr. Short's comments drew sharp criticism from his committee colleagues, because the perception by all of them is that a tax increase may be inevitable.
    So, Mr. Short's assertion is seen, by some, as 'crowd pleasing but not practical.' I think this is a very wrong perception.
    Mr. Short is a project manager for a Fortune 500 company and someone who was a commissioned officer in the U.S. Army for more than 20 years. Mr. Short has successfully been employed in an executive capacity within private industry for the years since his military retirement, and received both his undergraduate and graduate degrees. If he is saying there may be an ability to cut enough waste from the budget in order to deliver a tax decrease for the beleaguered taxpayers of the township, I would think the reasonable thing to do is for the committee to deal with this in a good faith manner of due diligence, at the very least. Instead, the committee majority meets notions of a tax decrease with derision - very nice.
    No one sitting on the committee today has as much experience in dealing with large-scale, corporate budgets as Mr. Short. This is the time to use individual skill sets wisely, but the committee majority seems intent to make the budgetary process a political event,
not paying attention to the fact that taxation in Middletown has grown unacceptably large.
    Every year it's more of the same: elaborate SUVs to several township employees, not all of which needed; 60-inch or more deluxe television sets where 42-inch sets would do just as well; extra vehicles, in general; and a host of items that could be scaled down to normative levels (not elaborate) in order to save money and still operate the municipal government wisely.
    On my way home some months ago, I was driving down Middletown-Lincroft Road and saw a township vehicle being used (a white sports utility vehicle) that had an occupied infant car seat in it. That is ridiculous. In fact, the whole notion of any employee being given an expensive vehicle for public and private use is absolutely irresponsible. The taxpayers are picking up the vehicles, and no doubt the gas, for employees who receive a paycheck. In the real world, people buy cars without government subsidy (and gas!) to commute back and forth from work.
    Last year, Mr. Short detailed a list of some costs that could have been cut if the committee had employed a modicum of actual oversight during the budget process. It is the lack of this oversight, and care for taxation, that has led voters in the past two election cycles to send members of the township's minority party to the committee. I think the message is pretty clear: Enough with the big, wasteful government.
    If a tax increase is necessary, and it may be, then good sense, due diligence and a head for fiscal management should first be used to extract all expenses that can be excluded. I am unconvinced this "budget process" by the Middletown Committee currently does this, and if it is then that is surely not a transparent mechanism on the part of the governing body.
    This is an important year for the Middletown governing body, and I have a feeling it's a test. If the ruling majority, which is Republican, cannot set aside the partisan nonsense and get down to the work of managing Middletown's debt and dollars, then maybe it's time for someone else to do it.
    Certainly, a few more minds like those of Mr. Short would not fail to be appreciated by the host of people who regularly receive tax bills in the mail. The 'party' is over in Middletown for freewheeling politicians, and it should be time to get to work.