By Asm. Gerry Scharfenberger
Of all the issues that divide New Jersey, perhaps none resonates with the way the disparity in treatment of suburban communities is compared with the rest of the state. Municipal aid, funding for education, and unfunded mandates are just some of the policies that are typically night and day depending on which part of the state you examine.
One of the most devastating unfunded mandates foisted upon suburban municipalities are the enormous housing quotas demanded either by the Department of Community Affairs (DCA), or in some cases, by court order. This is an outgrowth of the infamous 1975 Mt. Laurel Decision, that initially prohibited New Jersey municipalities from practicing what the court termed “exclusionary zoning.” Somehow over the course of 50 years, this decision has morphed into certain municipalities being saddled with massive housing quotas that threaten to alter their character forever. Aside from the environmental devastation caused by overdevelopment, traffic, and infrastructure stress, the strains on municipal services force local property taxes up even higher.
Conversely, there are 47 municipalities that have zero housing quotas – all in urban areas. The real irony is that urban areas have the infrastructure, public transportation, job centers and redevelopment opportunities to accommodate the sort of dense development that overwhelms suburban towns. If these mandates were really about creating affordable housing, why wouldn’t the municipalities best suited to adopt and maintain large scale development be in the mix?
The huge gap in school funding between urban and suburban districts is another indicator of Trenton’s lack of parity when it comes to apportioning tax dollars for education. Even allowing for higher numbers of students in certain urban districts, the sheer amounts of state aid, coupled with questionable expenditures, is evidence of an unfair distribution of tax dollars. In fact, the top ten receiving school districts receive over $4.4 billion in state aid, which accounts for over seven percent of the entire state budget.
Yet some of the absurd spending in urban districts include $2.9 million for catering for back-to-school nights, $4.5 million for a museum for the Newark School district, and paid junkets for school board members to destinations such as Honolulu, San Diego and Miami, to name a few.
While some New Jersey school districts are heavily funded, many more are fiscally strapped. Suburban school districts are routinely underfunded with legislation that actually caps how much aid these communities can receive. As a result, we see districts laying off teachers, cutting programs and closing schools. With health insurance premiums increasing over 25% in a single year, skyrocketing utility costs and jumps in labor and other related costs, the budget shortfalls often leave no other alternative.
Municipal aid is another area where suburban municipalities see little, if any benefit. An examination of the 11 receiving municipalities of so-called “transitional aid” show that of the $162 million distributed, only $8,854,801 or 5.5 percent went to suburban municipalities. The apportionment of general municipal aid is not very different. Many suburban mayors pray every year that their municipal aid allotment will not be cut. Even though such fixed costs as utilities, labor, capital expenses, etc. continue to rise, flat funding for municipal aid is considered a “win” in suburban communities.
Suburban communities are the lifeblood of New Jersey. The lopsided ratio of whatever pittance in state aid they receive, relative to what they send to Trenton in virtually every tax category, is staggering. There is, however, a fairly straightforward fix. Bill A1189, the “Fully Funding Schools and Cutting Property Taxes Act” would ensure that all school districts regardless of location receive adequate funding, while creating a mechanism to allow municipalities to lower taxes.
The same would hold true with court-ordered high-density development. Having currently exempt urban communities share in the quotas presently reserved for suburban towns, New Jersey could protect the environment while placing such development where the infrastructure, transportation and job centers to accommodate it already exist.
