Since many Hopewell Valley residents will begin voting this month, we thought it necessary to share why we will be voting no on HVRSD Referendum Question 2. As you may have read, HVRSD divided their referendum into two bond proposal questions.
Question 1 includes significant facilities upgrades and maintenance work. Question 2, on the other hand, incorporates no such maintenance. Specifically, Question 2 contains three projects: Bear Tavern addition ($16.1 million), Toll Gate addition ($8.7 million), and Tollgate Nurse Suite renovation ($1 million.)
Our reasoning detailed below is that the lion’s share of Question 2 can still be completed with a no vote to the referendum, and remaining proposals are not proven priorities. Let’s begin.
Voting Yes to Question 2 provides no tax advantage, and incurs unnecessary expenses. Facilities projects can be funded in one of three ways:
1. The regular budget including both the “general fund” and “capital reserves”
2. Bond debt approved through referendums, or
3. Third-party funding, such as government and municipal grants, or generous donors.
The advantage of funding through the regular budget is that the school board does not need taxpayer approval, which allows more flexibility on project timing.
The advantage of referendum funding is that projects the state classifies as high priority maintenance are eligible for debt service aid: rebates that reduce the taxpayer burden on the bond debt.
The school district divided the referendum into two questions. Question 1 proposes $58,409,000, and the entire amount qualifies for the state rebate. Question 2, on the other hand, proposes $25,826,000, and the amount eligible for debt service aid is negligible at best. Therefore, it provides limited, if any, tax advantage.
The benefit of third-party funding is that projects are not included in your school tax bill. Examples include past outdoor classrooms funded by nonprofits and foundations, as well as the upcoming playground at Bear Tavern funded through state grants and local families.
As recently as 2012, the Timberlane baseball field was funded by Hopewell Township’s PILOT revenues from Capital Health. We strongly believe Question 2’s Bear Tavern addition should be entirely funded through Hopewell Township PILOT revenues, and not included in referendum funding.
We believe that voting yes on Question 2 would result in additional significant taxpayer expense, aside from the obvious bond principal. Even if Hopewell Township pays for the $16.1 million Bear Tavern addition, the district will face fees from their bond counsel as well incur interest we’ll pay on the outstanding bond funds. It is far more cost effective for the township and HVRSD to execute a binding contract to directly cover addition expense.
Fund proven needs, and delay funding for less critical projects. According to the most recent demographers report, Bear Tavern Elementary School experienced the greatest enrollment increase of all district schools, both from 2013 to 2023 (from 340 to 422) and its forecasted increases from 2023-2033 (from 422 to 544.)
While their 2033 projected enrollment at 544 is still significantly lower than the 700+ they housed in the early 2000s, the projected growth of 60% over the next 20 years can undeniably justify a Bear Tavern addition in the future.
Conversely, over the same 20 years, Toll Gate Grammar School enrollment is forecasted to increase from 288 in 2013 to 326 in 2033, or a 14% increase. Funding a $9 million addition to house a net increase of 38 students over 20 years does not seem as critical, and in our view does require additional justification.
We support the district’s intention to update their demographer report to confirm demographic trends.
We are ambivalent about the nurse’s office renovation that costs less than $1 million. If the district believes the renovation is critical, they can fund it from their capital reserve piggybank, which in their most recently audit amounted to $7.4 million.
So, of the three Question 2 projects, the Bear Tavern addition is most justified, and should be funded by Hopewell Township as a third party and not as an increase to our debt. While the township has delayed executing a contract for this project, funding should be imminent.
In the May 2025 Hopewell Express, Mark Peters, HVRSD finance and facilities chair, said: “Everyone knows that lawsuit was dead on arrival and everybody knows the appellate was dead on arrival…” and was proven right last month when Pennington lost its appeal challenging the Hopewell Township PILOT. Hopewell Township should eventually pay out the $16.1 million they committed to cover the Bear Tavern addition.
From the Archives: Impasse persists among township, boroughs on school funding
The next referendum will be in less than 10 years. At the time of the 2016 referendum, the district noted that they bonded for $35 million in critical projects, although they identified $60 million in total outstanding projects, leaving a $25-million backlog. The district completed about $10 million of backlogged projects over the next 8 years. The projects were funded using “capital reserves,” and fortunately HVRSD’s audited capital reserve surplus still increased over 50% during that same period.
Yet, in 2024, HVRSD requested another referendum bond for more than double its 2016 request. Today, the district is requesting $84 million, and, according to Robert Colavita, has identified $120 million in planned projects. So, this time we inherit a $36 million backlog.
So even if the district aggressively addresses the backlog and rapidly grows capital reserves, another referendum will be needed as ongoing school facilities maintenance expenses continue to mount.
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Voting yes on Question 2 incurs unnecessary taxpayer expense. A no vote, on the other hand, can still result in two of the three Question 2 projects being funded outside of the referendum, and without incurring extra debt.
Like the turf fields in the last referendum request, the Toll Gate $9 million addition is a “nice to have” and is not proven critical. If the district can better defend the Tollgate addition, they can certainly add it to their inevitable, subsequent referendum request.
John Hart, a Republican, and Vanessa Sandom, a Democrat, are both former mayors of Hopewell Township. All references and sources are available at teahv.org.
Hopewell Valley Regional School District Board of Education building.,
