CALENDAR SHIFT
Trenton City Council officially approves shift from fiscal year to calendar year budgeting
TRENTON >> They’re getting their fiscal affairs in order.
Council narrowly approved a measure transitioning the city from a fiscal year to a calendaryear budget during the Thursday meeting.
The ordinance passed by a 4-3 vote, with dissenting legislators and residents worried the move — allegedly force-fed by state overseers — will do little to put the distressed capital city on better financial footing.
“If it’s not broke, don’t fix it,” resident Mary Horne said.
Officials from the Department of Community Affairs pitched council last month on benefits of switching to a calendar year, running from Jan. 1 to Dec. 31.
The city was on a fiscal-year calendar that ran from July to June 31.
Cities with similar financial predicaments, such as Patterson, made the transition, officials said.
Mayor Reed Gusciora’s administration was all for the proposal, saying the city would build reserve funds through two $69 million state aid payments in the next 18 months while only shelling out a single $25 million pension payment.
Business administrator Adam Cruz — who served as acting mayor in Gusciora’s absence — said the move would allow Trenton more than $30 million in reserves funds, on top of millions in coronavirus aid.
Officials are optimistic the move will keep Trenton’s property taxes flat over the next couple years — something legislators Kathy McBride and Robin Vaughn were deeply skeptical of in opposing the switchover.
“That is actually the case,” Cruz said. “It is incredible for people to say that it’s not a benefit. It’s on a silver platter. Take it or slap it down.”
The kicker is that the city must prepare two budgets over the next 18 months — the first covering July 1 to Dec. 31, 2021.
Officials had trouble prepping the most recent fiscal-year budget, six months late to introduce the first itineration.
Gusciora brought in Arch Liston as chief of staff to spearhead the transition.
At-large councilman Jerell Blakeley called the move a “nobrainer,” after hearing from the administration that departments could face steep cuts if the transition wasn’t executed.
Council voted on a companion bill to send an application to the Local Finance Board for approval of its calendar-year reversion, drawing barbs between Vaughn and Cruz.
Pressed over why legislators weren’t charged with filling out the application, Cruz claimed council didn’t “have the knowledge to fill out” the documentation.
That drew a stern rebuke from the West Ward leader.
“I’m too stupid to fill out an application,” she retorted.
Vaughn, McBride and Santiago Rodriguez voted against the switch, saying they didn’t feel it’d benefit Trenton in the long run.
McBride called the administration’s most recent July-to-December budget proposal “inflated” and claimed the city won’t get any state aid for which it’s not already entitled.
The city will benefit from two Consolidated Municipal Property Tax Relief Aid (CMPTRA) and Energy Tax Receipts payments over the next 18 months, she said, but it being weaned off transitional aid.
She accused two colleagues who hadn’t picked up their budget books of blindly supporting the mayor’s initiative.
“I’m not going to put them on the spot and say who they are.” she said.
Vaughn suggested the supposed pension payment perk was a glorified “deferment” that did nothing for Trenton’s future economic prospects.
“It’s not a benefit. It’s a burden,” she said of the calendar-year transition.
East Ward councilman Joe Harrison accused colleagues of grandstanding to score political points.
“Is this about being the next mayor?” he asked. “If you vote against it, that’s on your conscience.”
In other news, with little fanfare council approved a $250K loan package for Princeton Hydro, a Ringoes-based engineering firm relocating to the capital city.
It was announced in May that the company had signed a leas with Hx2 Development to occupy the historic Roebling Carpentry Shop in the Wirerope District.
Vaughn pushed back against the proposal after the mayor confirmed the city was kicking in quarter million in Urban Enterprise Zone funds as a deal-sweetener help the firm with the relocation.
Council changes rules of the loan-program initiative to reclaim control over fund disbursements.
The responsibility was previously vested in Ben Delisle, the economic and housing director.
Part of the company’s UEZ loan could be forgiven if it remains open for five years and hires a certain number of Trentonians for the 38 newly created positions in plans to bring to the city, per the resolution.