The Rahway Special Improvement District (SID) budget will remain the same as last year — $325,000 — deferring for another year the full anticipated budget amid the coronavirus pandemic.

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City Council unanimously adopted a resolution (AR-30-22) during its Feb. 14 regular meeting to introduce the 2022 budget for the Special Improvement District (SID). A public hearing and final approval is scheduled for the governing body’s March 14 regular meeting.

The proposed SID budget is identical to the $325,000 spending plan approved for 2021:

• Salaries and wages — $127,000 (39%)
• Programming/improvements — $110,000 (34%)
• Debt service — $42,000 (13%)
• Fringe benefits — $26,000 (8%)
• Administrative/operating — $20,000 (6%)

The total levy of $325,000 is generated through a tax of $0.129 per $100 of assessed value on the $252,071,550 in assessed value of SID properties, according to the 2021 Union County Abstract of Ratables. Previously, the SID assessment was $0.266 per $100 of assessed value on $49,049,500 of assessed value of 138 downtown properties.

In 2020, at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, City Council approved a $130,000 budget for the SID, which was in line with what it’s been historically, when the SID encompassed only about 140 downtown businesses since its creation in the early 1990. In recent years, it has been expanded citywide after a years-long legal battle that started in 2014 and ultimately was resolved in 2019.

The expanded SID, with more than 400 properties, was estimated to generate closer to $700,000 annually but the city has deferred that several times in lieu of the pandemic. The city has used some of the SID funds in the past to award COVID relief grants.

After the Rahway Center Partnership folded more than 10 years ago, management of the SID shifted to the seven-member board of the Rahway Arts and Business Partnership in 2010. That lasted until 2021 when  management of the SID was moved under the purview of City Council, designating it as the downtown management corporation.

City Council now typically holds its SID meetings immediately following its regular monthly meetings.

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