While Hamilton mayor Kelly Yaede delivered a lighthearted and confident report during her 2014 State of the Township address, her constituents in the rival political party did not match her enthusiasm.
The Hamilton Democratic Club issued a statement a day after Yaede’s Feb. 11 speech, taking a skeptical approach to the mayor’s positivity. The Democratic Club is a different entity than the township Democratic Party.
“The mayor’s comments in the State of Hamilton Township address were very optimistic,” the statement said. “For the sake of all Hamiltonians, we sincerely hope that the mayor’s optimism is warranted.”
The Democrats went on to pen a 1,500-word rebuttal of the Republican mayor’s speech, primarily aimed at Yaede’s two areas of focus: public safety and economic development.
The club praised the police for the 5 percent decrease in the township’s crime rate, but accused Yaede of endangering public safety for political gain by failing to report violent crime increased by 3.7 percent in the township last year. Even more damning, in 2013, assaults increased by 35 percent, according to the state police’s Uniform Crime Reporting unit.
The numbers bend both ways, though. Assaults with a gun, knife or cutting instrument decreased by nearly 7 percent, a statistic the Democratic Club’s statement did not address.
The Democrats also took issue with Yaede calling the township “a retail Mecca,” pointing to data they said paint quite a different picture of Hamilton’s direction.
Information from the Mercer County Board of Taxation’s ratable abstract shows the value of ratables in Hamilton Township has fallen $25.66-million since 2009. While the township’s numbers may display Hamilton isn’t quite Mecca, they also show that the value of ratables has declined in municipalities like Lawrence, Robbinsville and West Windsor during the same time period. Tax appeals, in each case, were the likely culpable for chipping away at the ratable base. In other words, the number of businesses could have increased, but the township still could see less tax revenues if the assessed value of those properties decreased. The worldwide economic downturn didn’t help matters.
Still, the value of ratables in Hamilton decreased more, in dollar terms, than all three of the aforementioned towns, and was also outpaced by East Windsor and Ewing, which saw their ratables grow in value between 2009 and 2013.
Yaede touted the relocation of Dynamic Marketing and Salvona Technologies to Hamilton, as well as the development of two new hotels and two WaWa gas stations/convenience stores, as proof of the township’s economic might. These businesses alone may not be enough to keep Hamilton afloat, the Democrats said.
“Based upon the enormous reduction in ratables over the past six years, these investments will not by themselves have any appreciable impact on our community’s ratables,” the club said in the statement. “The persistent failure to address the declining ratables will continue to increase the tax burden on our fellow residents. In fact, when compared to many Mercer County municipalities, Hamilton lags far behind in the economic recovery.”
The club also asked Yaede to reinstate the boards and commissions the Democrats say the administration has stymied, and called on the administration and council to fulfill their promise to begin filming and broadcasting council, planning and zoning board meetings. The proposal to film meetings has been bandied about by council for at least the last five years.
—Rob Anthes
