Valerio: Authorize 20 Years of Higher Taxes? Vote No

Editor's note: This piece was written by Tom Valerio, a resident of Cranford. It has not been edited. If you'd like to submit a letter to the editor, email whitney@patch.com. Read our coverage of the $20M repair referendum here. See other letters to the editor on this subject here and here.

I cannot accept that it is necessary for the Board of Education to raise Cranford taxes $12M - $20M over the next twenty years on top of the regular school budget.  I would ask Cranford Patch readers to consider this carefully when voting on December 8th.

The Board of Education has an annual income (or budget or revenue) of $53M.  What's your annual income and how much less is your income because the Board's income is $53M?

The BoE says that funding these types of projects cannot be a part of the regular budget, but that the funds need to be over and above or outside of the Board's annual revenue.  How many of you would go to your employer and say, "I need a new roof or boiler or renovations. Will you increase my pay? I don't budget for these things"?

The State of New Jersey is $33.9B in debt.  Do you really believe the State can or will chip in $8M?  If the State does, don't you understand that you will pay for this deficit spending in higher state taxes, reduced services or probably both?  We are not "getting anything back" from a State that has nothing to give.

The BoE congratulates itself in its 2009-2010 budget presentation on INCREASING the budget less than usual. "LOWEST [INCREASE] IN TEN YEARS[!]"  How many of you - who are paying for that budget - had your salary frozen or cut this year?  Or lost your job or feared for it?

Many Cranford taxpayers contributed $44.8M toward the $53M current school budget probably out of thinner wallets than in years past, and the BoE has not even hinted at a promise to not increase the school budget vis-à-vis the passage of this referendum.  What kind of lesson in fiscal responsibility is the Board teaching the children?  Or isn't it rather an example of a wholly inappropriate attitude of entitlement?

As I said, I cannot accept that it is necessary for the Board of Education to raise Cranford taxes $12M - $20M over the next twenty years on top of the regular school budget.  This referendum effectively sets a new, higher baseline for taxes.  For many, this higher level of taxes will be for the rest of your lives, or as long as you live or can afford to live in Cranford.  It is all together too much.

Thanks,

Tom Valerio