If you live in the northern Monmouth County Bayshore region or other coastal area in or around our state, you better start preparing yourself for the next big hit from Hurricane Sandy.
It doesn't matter whether or not you or your home were directly impacted by the storm or not. What matters is that if you happen to live in a town that was impacted by Sandy, you can expect your local property taxes to go up, WAY UP, this year as municipalities start putting together their budgets.
Due to the damage inflict on local residences and business as a result of Hurricane Sandy, many have lost a significant portion of their value while others will never be rebuilt. As a result, revenue generated by local property taxes will be significantly down for the foreseeable future, which means you will pay more to your town hall.
In Middletown, hundreds of properties in North Middletown, Port Monmouth, Belford and Leonardo were damaged and rendered uninhabitable (and may never be habitable again). Middletown still needs to generate roughly $45 million worth of revenues through local property tax assessments even though home values are no longer as high as they once were. Therefore, you can expect a huge increase in the tax rate to offset the loss of revenues created by the aftermath of Sandy.
So don't expect to hear much about trying to maintain that 2% cap on property taxes this year because it aint gonna happen.
The New York Times has an article on this today: Towns’ Next Hit From Hurricane Is to Tax Revenue
6 comments:
The 2% cap (plus exceptions) is on the entire levy for a governmental entity...not on an individual taxpayer's bill.
Lower assessments will mean a higher tax rate this year for sure, but the rate might decline the following year. For those who applied for re-assessments for storm damage, the assessment reduction is for 2013, with upward adjustment anticipated next year following rebuilding. The tax rate might decline in 2014 as a result.
Anon 6:37
That may or may not be true. It will depend on the speed of the recovery and how many people are capable of rebuilding.
It is time to fund only the essential services; and it may fnally be time to reduce the operating hours at the Middletown Cultural Arts Center. It may also be time to freeze all of the recent pay increases that the Township Committee just approved.
The budget should already be introduced and approved. Towns are now in a new budget year and are just beginning to draft a budget. In the mean time, funds are being spent that have not yet been budgeted for. By the time a budget is approved 2/3 of the budget has already been spent. So much for budgeting.
This is cool!
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