Woodbine Council Advances Authorities Transitions; Moves to Save Time, Money

WOODBINE – This borough’s council meeting Feb. 2 was taken up with approving the ordinance foundations of furthering the dissolution of two authorities into borough utilities, one for the airport and another for water/sewer. 
Borough Solicitor Richard Tonetta briefed the council on the various legal procedures necessary to effect those changes.
“The regulations that govern these authorities are being folded into borough ordinances. There are a number of actions we must take that are well underway to effect the transfer of property and realty.
“We need to transfer bank accounts, take care of other financial arrangements in place for the authorities, and leases including for example, with cell companies.
“For the airport, we need to take care of the leases at the hangars, for example for medical transport and individuals. Since the authorities, once they are transitioned into the borough as departments, will be self-funding, we need to keep their budgets separate from other borough finances and budgets,” Tonetta explained.
Borough Clerk Lisa Garrison continued the explanation of the process, “The borough will experience savings in both labor and money as we’ll be more efficient. We’ve been working with the state Civil Service to classify these authority positions into borough department positions and correctly assign them titles and salaries.
“We also need to make sure that health and pension benefits and payments are properly transitioned. We expect all of this to be a smooth transition and that we’ll be ready to operate on the start date of March 3,” she said. 
“In addition, people paying taxes and water charges will be able to do that together at one window rather than having to go to two. As Rick [Tonetta] mentioned, these new departments will be self-funding, so we need to be careful about our accounting including to send out delinquent notices. I’ve also worked out with the utilities authorities’ credit card company that we’ll pay half of what it used to pay, so that will be another saving,” she continued. 
“It’s great to see that these moves will save us money,” said Mayor William Pikolycky. “We’ll also be modernizing standards with this transition. For example, the current water main diameter is four inches, but with the switch-over, it now will be eight inches because that’s the borough standards. At the same time, the water rates will not change, there will be no increase.”
Affordable Housing
Tonetta updated council on the current state-of-play regarding the borough’s COAH (Council on Affordable Housing) obligations and the recent court decision on “gap” year expectations.
“I’m talking to the Fair Share Housing attorney so we can move forward with our eventual ‘gap’ number. Meanwhile, there is proposed state legislation that might establish a Fair Share Housing Bank that would capitalize obligations to ‘receiving’ municipalities from those ‘sending.’ The bank might be like DCA’s (Department of Community Affairs) Small Cities grants.” Pikolycky added, “These regulations are still in the very early stages, proposals are in the pipeline, but nothing is decided yet. They’re thinking about safety standards and how to rehab a property, so it’s safe for electric and heating, for example, to satisfy COAH requirements. The important thing is that Woodbine is meeting its COAH obligations and complying with what the court has recently decided.”
To contact Camille Sailer, email csailer@cmcherald.com.