What's right with the Council
Some may have missed an unexpected and rather candid speech from Council member Kates at this week's Council meeting that reflected nicely on the Council as a whole. Kates revealed that initially, she had some reservations about the process by which the Council examined the annual municipal budget this year, as it differed substantially from the way things were done under her tenure as mayor. Nonetheless, by the end of a painstaking and highly collaborative process in which members of the Council subjected every line item to careful consideration, she came to see the value in the new approach, Kates admitted. She singled out two Council members in particular, Councilmen Feit and Gussen, for their hard work and dedication in trying to ensure that the budget was as fair and efficient as could be.
Though the fact that the municipal budget itself checks in with a hefty year-over-year increase means that this brings only cold comfort to the Teaneck taxpayer, it is clear that the youthful exuberance of some of the newer Council members, off-putting as it may be to some, can also be a force for good.
posted by Teaneck Blog @ 11:59 AM
6 Comments:
I guess the Kates for Council in 2008 race has begun.
While I missed the middle two budget meetings, I was at all of the other meetings in the process. With six meetings this year, the Council held twice as many meetings as in previous years.
Moving from three budget meetings per cycle with one or two people joining me in attendance, it was a major milestone to have to move the meetings out of the Manager's office and into the Council Chambers. The issue of arranging the tables in the Chambers for future years to avoid having anyone's back turned to the public is a rather small price to pay for greater public interest, input and oversight into the formulation of the municipal budget.
Rather than operating a page-turning exercise, at the first meeting, pointed questions were asked about the initial budget by Councilmembers Gussen and Feit. While it clearly slowed down the process, this was a necessary step from several standpoints. It gave the four new councilmembers an opportunity to gain a better understanding of an unfamiliar budgeting process, provided a chance to ask specific questions without embarrassment and led to a realization that substantial changes need to be made in developing the municipal budget.
Most of the questions were the ones that could jump off the page. Why $1,000 for a computer printer when models sell for a fraction the price? In many cases, the Council did not have sufficient information to judge expenditures of $10,000 or $100,000, as there was no way to determine how the money was spent across multiple programs hitting a single line item.
Despite the best intentions of many on the Council, the year-to-year increase could not be held even close to four percent, let alone the zero percent budget Councilmember Gussen had advocated for.
Having spent years going through the Township's budget, I knew that there was no magic pot of gold containing millions in easy cuts. Teaneck compares reasonably well in many aspects of municipal spending compared to its peers in other municipalities.
The only way to get down to the Governor's new budget cap -- let alone to break through the 4% barrier -- will be to analyze the budget in even finer detail. The Council must be provided with a budget that breaks down expenditures by program, not just by line item.
To make substantive cuts, the Council will need to gain a better understanding of the programs our township operates, and to be able to make the tough decisions on which should be kept, cut or eliminated.
Just as you can't decide to remove a creche in the middle of December, you can't be making critical budget decisions in January.
As suggested by the Teaneck Community Project's Teaneck Taxes task force, a rolling set of reviews should be done of our departments and services, and they need to be performed on an ongoing basis throughout the year. The Council needs to make these decisions well before the budget is proposed, so that any transition issues can be addressed, before submitting a new budget.
Making substantive changes is possible. But they can only be made if the Council has the information it needs to make the tough decisions ahead of it.
Alan Sohn
Why weren't the new police cars put off once last year's cars didn't come on line for use till the end of the year? A big saving was missed.
There was a lengthy discussion about why the police cars should still be purchased (safety and vehicle maintenance being the cornerstone of that argument) at the February 20th meeting and Council voted 6-1, as I recall, to purchase the new ones -- Gussen was the one vote against.
Police cars are used as police cars for about three years. After about three years, the cars become far more costly to maintain as police cars. They are pulled off as they are replaced, and go through a whole chain of reuse by other departments until they're no longer usable and are sold off to the public.
The cars delivered late last year were the cars from four years ago that needed to be replaced. In two year's or so, when last year's late batch comes due, it might make sense to delay deliveries, as the cars would only be at the 30-month mark or so.
The cars that have hit the three year mark this year needed to be replaced. Postponing this delivery because the previous delivery was late is irrelevant and wouldn't have solved anything.
Alan Sohn
since the cars had survived their extra use, why wouldn't it make sense to put off replacement of the number that were new?
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