West Orange Town Budget Crosses Finish Line: See Tax Impact For Homeowners

WEST ORANGE, NJ — The West Orange Town Council gave a final stamp of approval to its long-awaited municipal budget at their meeting this week.

On Wednesday, council members voted in favor of the town’s latest spending plan, which totals just over $100 million. An average West Orange homeowner with a property valued at $615,472 will see an increase of $49 to the municipal portion of their taxes.

Property taxes in New Jersey are mainly made up of three parts: school, municipal and county.

It’s been a long ride to the finish line for the town council, which was presented with a proposed 6.2 percent tax hike from the mayor’s office in April: a $243 increase for the average homeowner. However, “revised looks at revenue” and “a lot of cuts” whittled that number down, council members previously reported.

In July, the proposed tax hike shrunk to $80. By September, the proposed tax hike had shrunk again to $24 – less than a 1 percent increase.

However, the state has since ordered West Orange to claw back some of that decrease, requiring it to increase the reserve for uncollected taxes from nearly $2.45 million to just over $3 million. This forced the council to make a budget amendment, which was introduced during a special meeting on Nov. 7.

The council finally nailed down the amended budget after a public hearing on Wednesday, voting unanimously in favor of the new spending plan.

The town’s inaugural Citizens Budget Advisory Board submitted a report on the 2025 municipal budget in October. View it online here.

Watch footage from the Nov. 12 town council meeting here, or view it below (video is cued to the hearing and vote on the budget):

GRACE PERIOD EXTENDED

The township recently announced that there was a delay in the mailing of the 2025 final/2026 preliminary tax bills due to the lack of an adopted budget.

“The municipal budget has not yet been adopted,” the town’s advisory stated. “Essex County will then strike the tax rate as soon as the budget is adopted. As a result, the grace period for the payment of West Orange fourth quarter property taxes will be extended beyond the original due date of November 1, 2025. An announcement for a new deadline of the extended grace period will be updated on the township website as soon as the information becomes available.”

At Wednesday’s meeting, council president Joe Krakoviak said the grace period will run through December.

Krakoviak said his peers plan to discuss ways to get the town’s annual budget out quicker in the future.

“One of the things that I think everybody learned is that we have a broken budget process,” he said. “I think everybody agrees on that.”

• See Related: West Orange School Budget With Staff Cuts, Tax Hike Gets A Green Light
  
• See Related: Here's How Much West Orange Homeowners Pay In Taxes (2025 Update)
• See Related: ‘Nightmare’ Tax Bills For West Orange Homeowners Linked To Revaluation

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