WOODBINE – Borough Council held its regular meeting Dec. 1 and opened the preceding workshop on operational issues with a presentation by Warren Broudy of the Meridian Group.
He had prepared a study on behalf of the state consolidation initiative for Woodbine and its Municipal Utilities Authority (MUA) and Port Authority.
“We’re really smart to be moving in this direction since, under state regulations, if municipalities are not heading towards shared services there can be penalties including cutting us off from our local aid,” explained Mayor William Pikolycky.
“While the exact level of savings may be difficult to quantify we can estimate that we’re looking at about $150,000 saved taxpayers’ money which translates to about 10/12 cents on the local tax rate. We’re eliminating redundancies even though there’s not going to be a lot of changes. There might be other such consolidations around the state so in that sense Woodbine is serving as a model for this type of consolidation arrangement,” he continued.
Under the proposal, the borough would apply to the state Department of Community Affairs (DCA) to put under one roof the management of the Port Authority and MUA thereby saving both operational overhead as well as employee costs.
Under the guidance of DCA, the borough first needed to introduce an ordinance indicating council’s intent to proceed with the consolidation. “In this way, the will of council is demonstrated, and we can move forward awaiting ultimate second reading and public hearing,” said Borough Solicitor Richard Tonetta.
Thus, a resolution was duly introduced and unanimously approved. The resolution authorized Tonetta to submit an application to DCA’s Local Government Services Unit and eventually dissolve the borough MUA and Port Authority under applicable state rules.
COAH Update
Tonetta updated council on the latest COAH (Council on Affordable Housing) proceeding noting he had recently talked to the judge assigned to overall COAH management.
“Several municipalities are in discussion about their quota numbers, and ultimately this should be resolved by council review in closed session. The state Supreme Court heard arguments this week about the applicability of a ‘gap period’ regarding not imposing housing obligations on municipalities as the appellate court had decided.
The outcome of this deliberation probably will not have a direct impact on Woodbine and might be a cost-savings for us since we won’t have to go to trial to decide what quota levels are applicable. We think the Supreme Court might hand down its decision by mid-January,” Tonetta said.
Verizon Might Need More Space
Pikolycky said he had received a letter from Verizon stating that it might need more space to place its “mini-systems” probably on existing or even new utility poles to fill in “dead spots.”
“They have the right to do so; it sounds like we need more information – like why don’t they use our water tower since we have an ordinance directing them to use that area first. We also need to be careful since what happens if Sprint and the others come to us and want the same access, we can’t discriminate and we can’t charge them to use our utility poles,” noted Pikolycky.
To contact Camille Sailer, email csailer@cmcherald.com.
Cape May – Governor Murphy says he doesn't know anything about the drones and doesn't know what they are doing but he does know that they are not dangerous. Does anyone feel better now?
