Reader says There is a limit to what property owners will pay, and we are there now.
I have run many businesses in my long career with tens of thousands of employees. Thanks for the compliment, but the Village manager job’s compensation wouldn’t cover my expense account for a month.
Having said that, when a business (or municipality in this case) is overburdened by generous compensations (=pay for you pinheads) and generous benefits (health insurance and retirement), the ONLY way to be able to continue paying these employees their increases is to ‘raise prices’ and ‘raise profit margins’.
In ‘simple speak’ so y’all can comprehend (=understand), that means raising property taxes. The residents are not about to stand for a property tax increase that can be avoided by outsourcing the services that can be accomplished by anyone with a pulse.
I saw in the paper that the Village advertised a position for an equipment operator that was grossly above what a private sector employee would command (what they would GET for pay)
So maybe you simpletons can understand. EVERYONE is replaceable. Your union contract can easily be converted to toilet paper. Do yourself a favor, if you expect job security, make some recommendations for increased productivity (=work harder and do more). Whining and complaining will make your jobs disappear.
In the real world, when wages become uncompetitive, we move manufacturing to states without unions, such as South Carolina and Alabama. The unions lose members, and the lackey politicians in the Northeast lose a taxpayer, which just shifts the burden (=amount of taxes) to other who are unfortunate enough to still live here.
There is a limit to what property owners will pay, and we are there now.
Who is this guy?
Why isn’t the BOED and there portion of the property taxes ever mention in these post?
people come on, do you think are tax’s will ever go down. wake up.
#2 is correct in that a majority of our local taxes are for the schools. What’s more, the majority of those expenditures are mandated by the State. The problem is still the same at both the state and local levels, union contracts fix the price of labor at artificially high levels. Period. Until we can get back to a free market for commodity labor such as trash collection and snow plowing, we will be paying too much in taxes both at the state and local levels.
All of that does not excuse our Mayor and his running mates of their obligation to provide basic services which are clearly in decline. And please don’t blame it on the snow – yes it’s been a snowy winter, but we live in the Northeast where it snows. Prior administrations managed to pick up the garbage and plow the streets – when my taxes were half what they are now.
#4, that’s because all of the increases in your property taxes have gone to pay for wage increases and ever higher pension & healthcare benefits. The growth in those expenses is squeezing out all other budget items, including shade trees, snow removal, garbage pick-up and recycling. Our Village services are in decline because, we, as a Village, have agreed to some of the highest police & fire wages in the entire United States – well above Bergen County and NJ state averages, with 10% or less of those salaries going to pension contributions, and a maximum of $400 out of pocket for family health care coverage. We gave 4% annual wage increases from 2009~201 to police & fire, agreed upon by three of the current Council at the depths of the recession in 2009. Two members of the current Council agreed to a 12% retroactive wage increase in 2011 for our previous Village Manager. Don’t believe the status quo patrol in these blogs – it’s clearly in their self interest to demand annual property tax increases, because that’s what fuels all of the taxpayer give aways they’ve negotiated into their contracts and multi-million dollar retirement benefits. That’s why they always blame the BoE, million dollar home owners, and are so critical of anyone asking for tax reductions, because it goes against their personal interests.
If we posted the wages of some of our employees, you would see that their pay (including PSEG side jobs) exceeds that of most of the residents.
Amazing but true.
#5 is like a broken record. He want all unions to give back thing that money gain will go directly into a reduction in his property taxes. Then he can use the extra money to by maybe to join an new golf club or another vacation. Its a shame the only government employees wages and benefits are posted. .
The post keep harping on police maybe he got a ticket and just can’t get over it.
Amazing how many “anonymous” union hacks are posting on a Republican blog, all the while playing class warfare. You guys are the ones with multi-million dollar pensions & almost free full coverage healthcare for life. It’s not like you earned those pensions working the mean streets of Paterson, Camden or Newark. You earned them in Ridgewood – so stop the tired “give back all the money” union line. Nobody’s aksing for you to give up your country club lifestyle in Ridgewood – we’re asking for concessions in the next contracts to reduce the rate of GROWTH in taxes. Public sector unions in Ridgewood have gotten pretty much everything they’ve asked for for 20+ years. As a result, we have some of the highest paid municipal employees in the entire U.S. now, with property taxes to match. Given the promises we’ve made on pensions & healthcare, those costs are exploding, too. But you’d rather keep raising taxes to pay more into a black hole of cronyism – that’s called tax & spend, and it’s a tired, broken idea. Look what the UAW did to the auto industry in Michigan and Ohio. – and yet we just blindly give in to municipal union demands in Ridgewood. Why ?
#9 Maybe you should stop living above your means and follow your own advice and downsize.
Property taxes should be just like our income taxes, higher rates for larger incomes. Why shouldn’t we have different rates per 100 where the high wage earners who buy expensive homes pay more than the lower wage earners who buy modest homes.
If that is fair for income taxes why not for property taxes? A $1,000,000.00 Ridgewood home would be taxed at say $27,600.00 (2.760 per 100) while a $500,000.00 home would pay $11,780.00 (2.36 per 100). Those who have the income to buy the very expensive homes have the income and should pay more.
So true unless they live above their means and want to keep up the image.
#11 – at some point the wealthy will just get fed up and leave for regions of the country that tax them less. This will at some point make you “wealthy” by default and having to pick up the whole municipal tab yourself. Your financial situation may not have changed but you’ll still be expected to pay more. What you propose is not sustainable.
Like them or not, you need a couple of rich guys around because they’re already picking up most of your tab.
#13, Your statement is false for the following reasons. One, the high wage earners will not leave their high paying jobs here to take the same job in another part of the country at a lower salary. Second, as home values rise people who own the more expensive homes know they are benefiting more from that increase than others. For example, a 100,000.00 home that increases by 10% gains $10,000.00. while a $200,000.00 home that increases by 10% nets double or a $20,000.00 gain. Simple math. Smart people and fee based financial planners know living here in the northeast earning high salaries while owning expensive homes and paying the taxes is far better than moving to accept a lower salary and standard of living to save on taxes. That is a fools argument. If that were the case New York City would be a ghost town.
that might of worked before the internet but today there are simply barriers
Where are all these rising home values? Not here. Prices tanked from the high’s of 2006, 2007 and are nowhere near what they were.
Many of the big ‘earners’ left NYC years ago for CT. Then CT couldn’t resist and implemented an income tax. Many hedge funds are still in Greenwich and Stamford to avoid NY/NYC taxes.
Many of the very big earners that I know have moved to FL for their principle residence (when able). Unless they send their kids to boarding school, they’d stay around here until the last one graduates High school.
Many of the 500k-10million earner types have to have a presence in the area. But the real big earners head south. As such, their income taxes must be replaced by the rest of us. Class warfare never works. But the left wingers keep using it to ‘rally the troops’ and in the end, the smart rich guys manage to legally keep as much of their well earned income away from the tentacles of the government. This crap never worked in Cuba and North Korea, and it wont work here. So will one of you Dumbocrats please tell Barry to pick a new subject.
Progressive taxation on property owners – that’s going to encourage people tot want to live to Ridgewood ? Are you serious ?
#17 I get your sarcasm but the residents of N.J. love taxes. Didn’t the residents of New Jersey just vote to approve an increase in the minimum wage which will increase the cost of good and services thought the state? That is just the same as raising taxes, it is going to cost everybody more and damage the state economy.
So yea lets have progressive taxation on all New Jersey property owners not just Ridgewood – if it’s good enough for our income tax system it should be good enough for property taxes.
N.J. is a Blue state (Democrat) and taxing the rich is what democrats do….so lets just do it like Nike says.
Agree #16 and $17, so much for the Ridgewood Blog, this should be the Red Blog…. I’ve seen suggestions in here that are frankly un-American, like progressive taxation on property values – there’s no room there for abuse of tax assessments ? Right. Or reduced assessments on sales of homes from parents or estates to children at below market value ? Right. Others have suggested higher property taxes on those making over $250K, ever more annual tax increases, or that successful private sector workers have never worked a hard day in their life. But when taxpayers ask for higher drug and doctors’ visits co-pays from the current $5 and $15, respectively, and market rates for health insurance instead of the $400 family plans we give away today, it’s like we’re stealing food from our comrades’ tables instead of the other way around. No wonder this blog runs headlines like “United States of Decline – America unravels at an increasingly dizzying pace”. We can thank our Red comrades on this blog for that. Spasibo !