As the annual school board elections near, some residents have already publicly rejected the district’s $158.55 million spending measure, saying the tax increases are too high.
But the facts show that taxes are increasing by 2.5 percent over last year — a percentage that falls within the state-mandated 2 percent cap, with exceptions. The way those taxes are apportioned among individual households is due to factors outside of the district’s control.
Voters have been supportive of the annual budget for more than a decade. The last time the budget failed was in 1999 — by just five votes.
If the budget fails, it will head to a joint meeting between the West Windsor Township Council and the Plainsboro Township Committee, where officials will decide what to cut, if anything. Despite initial criticism from two of its own board members, the board unanimously approved the budget to be placed on the ballot with the 2.5 percent tax increase.
The proposed $158.55 million budget represents an overall $2.7 million increase (1.72 percent) over last year’s $155.9 million budget. But the tax levy will increase to $147.12 million, an increase of $3.6 million over last year’s $143.5 million tax levy.
Breaking down the tax burden, however, Plainsboro will have a greater increase in taxes this year.
Plainsboro taxpayers will pay $60.9 million in support of the school budget — a 2.8 percent increase over last year’s tax levy. In West Windsor, the amount to be raised by taxation is $86.1 million, an increase of 2.3 percent over last year’s levy.
If the budget is approved by voters, the tax rate in Plainsboro would increase by 7.5 cents — from $1.55 per $100 of assessed value in 2010 to $1.62 in 2011. The tax rate in West Windsor would increase by 8.8 cents — from $1.34 per $100 in 2010 to $1.43 in 2011.
Officials have said that declining home values had a significant role in the tax burden this year, as the value of the average home in Plainsboro fell from $395,000 to $389,000, and from $534,787 in West Windsor to $527,376.
The overall assessed property values declined by 0.6 percent in Plainsboro (from $3.72 billion to $3.70 billion) and by 2 percent in West Windsor (from $6.08 billion to $5.97 billion) — meaning the burden is handled by less value.
For the owner of the average assessed home of $389,000 in Plainsboro, the school tax bill would be $6,317, up from the $6,119 the owner of a home assessed at $395,000 paid last year.
In West Windsor, the average school tax bill for the owner of a home at $527,376 would be $7,536, up from the $7,171 the owner of a home assessed at $534,787 paid last year.
One of the most vocal opponents of the budget is Plainsboro resident Quentin Walsh, who points to the increases in the tax rates this year as unacceptable.
“The district has prepared this budget with little regard for the financial reality of the community,” said Walsh, who says his views are separate from those of his wife, Ellen, who sits on the WW-P school board. “They feel that they are entitled to use exceptions to increase the budget by more than the state cap. When the tax rate increases, they throw up their hands, claim that they can’t control the assessment changes and then wash their hands of the burden placed on the taxpayers.”
Walsh points to his own school tax bill, which was $8,826 in 2009; $9,449 in 2010; and estimated to be $9,913 in 2011. Walsh’s assessment has remained the same over the three years.
The school board has acknowledged the tax rate increases, but the state-mandated cap applies to the overall tax levy, which will increase by 2.5 percent. As such, the tax rates for each community will collect taxes that accumulate to that 2.5 percent, although they will affect residents differently to get to that number. School officials argue that because of this, a higher tax rate does not mean higher taxes in every case.
Most heavily affected, though, are residents who did not get a reassessment or file a tax appeal, who would be paying more because a higher tax rate on a house where the value has not changed.
School board president Hemant Marathe explains that taxes are broken down three times. First is the overall tax levy, which is the total taxes paid by all property owners — residents and businesses together — in the budget. From there, the tax levy is split into West Windsor and Plainsboro, depending on the per-pupil population. That is further split into individual taxpayers, based on their property assessments.
The tax levy will increase by 2.5 percent, but the tax rate in West Windsor will increase by 6.7 percent, from $1.34 per $100 to $1.43 per $100. In Plainsboro, the tax rate increase is 4.5 percent, from $1.55 per $100 to $1.62 per $100.
In West Windsor, there were whole sections of the township that were reassessed, says Marathe. He said he knows the assessments and tax bills of about a dozen friends, all of whom have been given lower assessments between 2010 and 2011.
“On average the tax increase is very low,” he said. “To say that taxes in West Windsor are going up because the tax rates are going up is completely untrue.” This is because the tax rate will affect various residences differently, he said.
“In Plainsboro, the increase in the tax rate is a shift in equalized valuation to per-pupil,” he added. “The school district has no control over that because that’s what residents voted. A significant portion of the Plainsboro tax increase is because of the shift between equalized valuation to per pupil.”
Marathe said when it comes to actual spending increases, the district increased spending by 1.6 percent two years ago, zero percent last year, and 1.6 percent this year. Marathe asked voters to take a fair look at the spending when looking at the increases.
Another hot issue has been the amount of money allocated to the Princeton International Academy Charter School. The district allocated $950,000 to the charter school, even though it is estimated that it will cost WW-P $1.2 million. Critics have questioned what the school board did with the $400,000 it allocated last year for the charter school.
“The WW-P school district is saying that they will only budget $950,000 for PIACS,” said Parker Block of PIACS. “They are not mentioning the fact that they already budgeted $400,000 last year for PIACS (which, of course, they did not spend and put in capital reserves). So WW-P has actually set aside over $1.3 million in tax dollars allocated for PIACS.”
“The practice of over allocating has been going on for years, resulting in a huge capital reserve,” he added. “While taxes are increased year after year, and new scapegoats found, the surplus fund grows and grows. The existence of such surpluses in suburban districts was cited by Governor Christie as a primary reason for cutting state aid last year.”
However, Marathe says this is also untrue. The district put the $400,000 from last year’s charter school allocation back into the $8 million surplus — $6 million of which was used as tax relief for this year (see story above). The remaining $2 million will be used for next year’s tax relief, he said.
Block goes on to say that approximately 75 percent of students enrolling for first and second grade at PIACS are currently enrolled in public schools.
“Naturally, none of the children enrolling in kindergarten are currently in public schools since there are no public pre-K programs,” he said “If a student is already in the public system, there is already a cost to taxpayers to educate these students. It can be argued that approximately 25 percent of those attending PIACS would otherwise be attending a private school next year.”
Block also says that because 75 percent of the PIACS students from WW-P would otherwise be attending a WW-P public school next year, the student/teacher ratio in these traditional WW-P schools will improve.
Three Seats Contested
Residents will be asked to approve a $158.55 million spending measure and elect three candidates to seats on the WW-P school board on Wednesday, April 27.
Polls will be open from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. On the nine-member Board of Education, five seats are designated for West Windsor residents and four seats are designated for Plainsboro residents. All members serve a three-year term. In this election year, two seats are available in West Windsor, and one seat is available in Plainsboro.
In West Windsor, three candidates have filed for the two open seats. Incumbent Richard Kaye, of Coneflower Lane, will seek re-election. Dana Krug, of Ellsworth Drive, and Scott Powell, of Cambridge Way, will also run for election. Incumbent Randall Tucker did not file to run for re-election by the March 8 deadline.
Incumbent Alapakkam Manikandan, of Ashford Drive, will face challenger Rachelle Feldman Hurwitz, of Dogwood Drive, for one open seat in Plainsboro. For more information on each of the candidates, log on to the News’ website at www.wwpinfo.com.
