Paterson still has unpaid sewer bills from developers
Old fees were to be paid before new construction
PATERSON – Mayor Andre Sayegh’s administration has fallen short on its commitment to recoup more than $1 million in uncollected sewer connection fees from developers.
Paterson Press wrote about the unpaid fees last September, at which time Sayegh administration officials said the money would be collected by the end of 2023.
But more than 100 days into 2024, the Sayegh administration recently acknowledged that the city has not collected all the money. The mayor did not respond to multiple inquiries about the uncollected fees. His chief of staff, Habib Kader, issued a four-sentence statement on Friday afternoon.
“Over the past several months, Paterson has made significant strides in addressing the issue of unpaid sewer connection fees,” Sayegh’s aide said. “We’ve already collected a substantial amount and are diligently working to collect the remainder.
“While progress has been made, we understand there is more work to be done,” Kader said. “Rest assured, we are actively working to collect the remaining unpaid fees.”
Paterson Press asked Kader exactly how much already has been collected and how much remains unpaid. He did not respond to those questions.
Sayegh often has boasted that investors have spent more than $1 billion in Paterson since he became mayor in 2018. “Paterson is open for business,” he has said repeatedly, referring to the wave of new development. Most of those projects received tax breaks that allow them to delay paying their full municipal property taxes for more than two decades.
The uncollected sewer fees were supposed to be paid to the city before the new construction began.
MICHAEL KARAS/NORTHJERSEY.COM
‘There’s no leverage’
David Gilmore, the city’s community improvements director and a frequent critic of Sayegh, said developers have little reason to pay Paterson now, with their projects already opened.
“There’s no leverage,” Gilmore asserted.
Exactly how much money is at stake remains somewhat unclear. Last summer, administration officials estimated the amount of overdue fees at about $1.4 million. At that time, they said they were still putting together an accurate and comprehensive list.
Emails and memos circulated among city officials in 2023 put the amount of uncollected fees somewhere between $1.2 million and $2 million.
Many of the projects on the unofficial lists from last year were built by Paterson’s most prominent developer, Charles Florio, a longtime supporter of Sayegh. Florio has said many of his entries on the city’s unpaid sewer fee lists were inaccurate, including properties he no longer owns or jobs for which he said he submitted the payments.