In this day, how can a “mini-village” such as Plainsboro approve a 3.7 percent budget increase to $27.45 million, when the community itself is not asking for any of it?
We have an outsized police and fire department with enough equipment to serve towns multiples our size. We have, by my last count, 35 full-time police officers who spend our tax dollars sitting in their cars for countless hours on patrol of Plainsboro Road, the most laughed about speed trap in the state, supported by a kangaroo court determined to protect our safety by nailing drivers going 30 in a 25 (My car doesn’t idle at less than 30).
And now we want to give them expensive, high-tech license plate readers to invade our privacy even more.
We have a schools budget that rivals any top private college prep school. We continue to spend money on a free library when libraries have become obsolete in today’s high-tech world. We spend enormous sums constructing “designer” paver sidewalks and crosswalks for a commuter town where you can count the number of walkers on one hand.
Our streets are in disrepair. Flat tires caused by potholes are on the rise, and snow removal was seriously flawed during our recent snowstorm, but we can rest easy because Plainsboro Road is safe from any outside wrongdoing.
I encourage the citizens of Plainsboro to call for a reduction in our police department by 50 percent and a 20 percent reduction in our schools budget, and apply the savings to paving our roads, expanding retail services and maybe, just maybe, reducing our taxes.
Dennis Buchert
Plainsboro
