The Coast Star reported that Point Pleasant's Mayor, "had no problem with dissolving the shared services agreement with Point Pleasant Beach regarding the municipal courts". No discussion at a Council meeting, no comment from other Councilpersons...just it was all right by him.
There are nearly 600 separate municipalities in N.J. For a small state like N.J. that number is "off the charts". Most other states have many fewer separate legal entities. The reason? Simply because operating a lot of municipalities is very expensive and mostly redundant. Nonetheless, the Borough Mayor is among those who favors "home-rule" over efficiency and costs.
New Jersey has too many layers of bureaucracy...there is local government, county government, and state government. These layers cost money and lots of it. The layers of government and the tax dollars needed to support them has driven our state to near bankruptcy. The number of school districts is equally high and has contributed to insane property tax levels.
As a reader, there is only one question you need ask yourself...Am I better or worse off living in a state that has the nation's highest number of local municipalities and school districts. If N.J.'s taxes weren't the highest in the nation, or if the schools were the best in the nation, you might say, "the structure is worth the expense". Unfortunately, N.J has the highest taxes in the nation (even surpassing "the Peoples Republic of California"), but we do not have the finest educational system in the nation. That being said, we here in N.J. are not getting much of a bang for all our bucks!
Enter Mr. Point Pleasant Mayor...he says consolidation is not a good idea. What does he base that on? Well, partly on the point of view of the shared court administrative staff. They suggest the beach got the raw end of the deal financially...and this is coming from a person who works for the Borough (in part). Sounds like she favors the Beach (in full). When did employees get the right to speak out on issues of "fairness" about policy issues that are supposed to be the exclusive domain of the elected officials. The judge also had "concerns". Just what they are was not explained.
Once again the Mayor was speaking off the top of his head. Letting the shared service agreement go by the wayside is a perfectly awful idea for all the reasons stated above. If there are things about the agreement that need to be discussed and worked out, then Council representatives should meet and work them out. To toss the whole framework in the trash makes no sense whatsoever.
More shared services and consolidation is what N.J. needs to get our finances in order and put to best use precious resource dollars. What do you think?
