A tax appeal settlement with the city’s largest taxpayer, Merck & Co., will cost the average taxpayer another $66 this year, on top of what was expected to be a $146 municipal tax hike for the average Rahway home. The City Council approved the settlement by a 6-0-1 vote during its meeting last week.
Continue reading Merck tax appeal adds $66 to municipal tax bill
Refunds were approved for 52 tax appeals last year, twice as many as were filed and settled at the county Board of Taxation in the 2009 tax year.
Closer to home, there’s this story from MyCentralJersey.com, Piscataway budgets $500G for tax appeals, as well as this one from the Cranford Chronicle, Citing tax appeals, Cranford officials say surplus is down to $58,000 from previous estimates of $1 million.
In November,
the City Council approved a multi-year tax appeal settlement for 1510 Main St./90 E. Cherry St. (Block 318, Lot 12) that had been pending in Tax Court. (It was not among the 52 appeals in 2010).
After holding a public hearing on the municipal budget last month, the City Council is expected to vote on the spending plan at its meeting on Monday at 7 p.m.
The 2011 budget, which runs through June, is $44.9 million, with approximately $31.1 million (up from $29.7 million last year) coming from property taxes. The governing body held a public hearing on the budget at its January meeting but tabled approval of the spending plan until the February meeting. The overall budget is up about 1.3 percent from last year while last year’s budget was up about 4.5 percent.
The average home, assessed at $133,000, paid roughly $2,280 in municipal taxes last year, and that total is expected to rise by about 6 percent, according to City Administrator and Redevelopment Director Peter Pelissier. A 6-percent increase would bump last year’s average municipal taxes paid by about $136, for a total of almost $2,416.
Municipal taxes generally make up about a quarter of the overall tax bill, with another quarter from county taxes and half from school taxes.
In case you missed it, the Merck-Schering-Plough merger, announced almost two years ago, looks like it will mean some of Merck’s Rahway employees, as well as some in Summit and Union, will be moved to Kenilworth eventually. The firm plans to convert its Kenilworth campus into a research center focused on biologics, according to this Star-Ledger report last month. Some 580 manufacturing jobs will be lost while another 900 employees in marketing, HR and legal will move to the headquarters in Whitehouse Station.
City Council tonight will hold a public hearing on the 2011 municipal budget during its regular meeting tonight at 7 p.m.
Sunday’s Star-Ledger had this story that examines Rahway’s redevelopment efforts over the years and the state of downtown. I’m not sure I would call the 50-unit St. Georges Avenue apartment complex that went up in flames this month a “symbolic achievement” as much as other downtown projects, like the 222-unit Carriage City Plaza or 159-unit Park Square (which didn’t even warrant a mention in the piece). What did everyone else think?
In this first State of the City address, Mayor Rick Proctor pledged to continue redevelopment focused on the arts, remove barriers to stimulate revitalization and recruit new business and redevelopment projects while beginning to actively market the city.
Catching up on some older items during this slow week, the City Council last month approved a 2010 budget of about $130,000 for the Special Improvement District (SID).
A public hearing and final approval of an ordinance that would restrict parking along Pierpont Street will be held during the City Council’s regular meeting on Monday.
City Administrator and Redevelopment Director Peter Pelissier said complaints were received about commuters parking along much Pierpont Street, making it difficult for res
idents to find parking for their own cars and visitors. Residents were surveyed and only one negative response was received, according to city officials. Residents would get a Parking Authority sticker to place on their cars.
Wenson-Maier lives on nearby Bryant Street where parking also was restricted in recent years. “It took some getting used to but it was heavily overparked and it’s better for a majority of the block. It’s a little bit of a hassle but it’s provided some more parking,” she said.
The City Council will hold a public hearing on the proposed budget for the Special Improvement District (SID) at its regular meeting on Tuesday (not Oct. 5, as originally reported when the governing body introduced the plan).
The SID budget proposes to raise $131,565.94 in taxes, based on a rate of $3.34 per $100 of assessed value on about 138 downtown properties. The parcels have a total assessed value of $39.391 million.
About 31 individual lots pay at least $1,000 in SID taxes, and among those, at least eight properties would pay at least $4,000:
* Carriage City Properties, $10,923.13 [$8,192.35 for hotel + $2,730.78 for retail space]
*RSI Bank, 1500 Irving St., $9,671.97
* SDI Technologies, 1299 Main St., $7,278.53
* Rahway Office Center c/o Basad Realty Management, $6,220.08
* Raw Realty, 123 E. Milton Ave., $4,025.37
* MM Rahway Associates, 1537 Main St., $4,016.02
* The Center Circle, 1255 Main St., $4,008
This past spring, the City Council shifted the taxes collected through the Special Improvement District from the Rahway Center Partnership to the Arts District. (Contrary to some public perception, however, the Partnership has not dissolved but just no longer has any paid staff.)
The New Jersey Hot Dog Tour earlier this month included a stop at Rahway Grill on East Cherry Street, where The Star-Ledger/nj.com called it “old-timey…with its screen door, booths, swivel stools, coat racks and Rhapsody II Stereophonic jukebox.” Apparently, their chili was a big hit with the tour.
Check out how the Rahway Grill did in our polls for favorite burger and favorite breakfast place.