The Place for Jersey City News
Log In / Register
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
Jersey City Times
  • News
  • Food and Fun
    • Food And Drink
    • Performing Arts
    • Visual Arts
    • Other Fun Stuff
  • Education
  • Business
  • Neighborhoods
    • Downtown
      • News
      • Guide
    • Heights
      • News
      • Guide
    • Journal Square
      • News
      • Guide
    • Bergen Lafayette
      • News
      • Guide
    • Greenville
      • News
      • Guide
    • Westside
      • News
      • Guide
  • Opinion
  • Columns
    • Eye Level
    • Mamarama
  • Obituaries
  • Event Calendar
  • Support our Mission
  • Search
  • Menu Menu
Board of Education Passes $974 Million Budget: Big Tax Hike Coming

Board of Education Passes $974 Million Budget: Big Tax Hike Coming

Andrea Crowley-Hughes
March 22, 2022/in Education, header, Latest News, Narrate, News
by Andrea Crowley-Hughes

The Jersey City Board of Education narrowly approved a $973.8 million budget on Monday that will keep school staffing and operations stable in the 2022-23 academic year and raise school taxes by $134 per month on a $460,000 home.

The budget vote passed 5–4 after board trustee Paula Jones-Watson, who had originally voted “no,” introduced a motion to reconsider, prompting a second vote and changing her vote to a “yes.”

Board President Gerald Lyons and trustees Lorenzo Richardson, Noemi Velazquez, and Gina Verdibello joined Jones-Watson in supporting the budget. Trustees Younass Barkouch, Alexander Hamilton, Natalia Ioffe, and LeKendrick Shaw voted against the spending plan.

After several board members at last Thursday’s special budget meeting said they could not support the $200 per month school tax increase in the preliminary budget, Acting Superintendent of Schools Norma Fernandez and School Business Administrator Regina Robinson presented a budget with a lesser tax impact on Monday.

Reductions in overtime pay known as “comp time,” adjustments to facilities spending and operations investments, and the use of excess surplus and fund balance helped reduce the local tax levy from $483 million to $426 million.

In addition to a share of local property taxes, Jersey City schools receive funding from the state and the federal government, the latter of which is restricted to expenses such as pandemic recovery and technology.

Officials on Thursday emphasized that the budget is necessary for the continued functioning of the district and that there was little room for change without making difficult cuts to staffing. Nevertheless, by Monday they were able to slightly blunt its effect on school taxes.

“Dr. Fernandez and I talked about scaling, putting austerities in place, and making sure that we manage the dollars,” Robinson said on Monday.

Although the board president said staff positions yet to be filled will have to be looked at carefully, the budget does not appear to reduce the number of teachers in the district nor change the district’s ability to follow the recently adopted long range facilities plan to upgrade its old physical plant.

“Approximately 77 percent of the budget is costs associated with salaries and benefits,” Fernandez said. “Every year, wages, benefits, and insurance increase as do the goods we purchase.”

“We operate 46 school buildings: 14 of those buildings are over 100 years old, 16 are over 80 years old, and only 11 of the buildings are under 50 years old,” the superintendent added.

The overall tax impact on city residents will depend not only on that portion of homeowners’ property taxes dedicated to the schools but on levies from the city and county that are yet to be determined. These levies could potentially offset costs for residents.

Between the meeting’s first failed vote and the successful second attempt, Richardson, a former board president, emphasized this point.

“When we render the levy, that’s not necessarily a tax increase,” Richardson said. “Yes, it affects the tax bill, but there are other mechanisms in place to address that, and we saw that last year,” he said, referring to the city’s ability to ask for a lesser share of property taxes.

Richardson was optimistic that Gov. Phil Murphy’s ANCHOR program for property tax relief as well as a program that allows senior citizens to freeze their taxes will help some residents who are affected by rising costs.

Jersey City public schools’ funding crunch was precipitated by many things, among them an increase in home values throughout the city and a significant amount of new development that has taken place since Trenton last visited the city’s funding position. These factors contributed to the rise in the city’s tax base, which stood at $45 billion in 2021.

Despite this high valuation, prior to this year, Jersey City had the 49th lowest tax rate according to data compiled by St. Peter’s University Assistant Professor Brigid D’Souza. State lawmakers considered this unfair to other municipalities, and as a consequence announced just days before the budget was initially presented that they would cut the city’s aid by $68 million.

This was not the first time the state recently reduced the city’s school funding though. It also did so in 2018 after passing a new funding formula known as S2 that was designed to phase out “adjustment aid” in areas with higher property values.

Jersey City is also collecting less money than it had anticipated it would from corporate payroll taxes. For the 2021–22 fiscal year this source of funding was estimated to be $225 million. But City Hall has certified only $65 million, a shortfall of $160.7 million (toward the 2022–23 school year) that school officials said last week the city is unlikely to make up.

“It is actually a perfect storm of events that leaves us students at risk,” Fernandez said of the reasons for the shortfall that the budget’s tax levy increase is helping to close.

Some of the trustees who voted against the budget said they were doing so because a school tax increase would make Jersey City even more unaffordable for economically disadvantaged students and their parents.

Barkouch said his stance had not changed since Thursday, when he said, “If we increase the school tax levy, rents will increase, and economically disadvantaged families will suffer and ultimately be pushed out of Jersey City — or worse — made homeless.”

Patrick Sprinkle, a public commenter identifying himself as a teacher, agreed.

“I worry that the tax increase would be higher than the cost of living,” Sprinkle said. “It would be increasingly unaffordable for working class people and middle class people to afford to own homes in Jersey City.”

But the majority of parents who called in to Monday’s meeting asked the board to support the budget.

“Taxes will increase regardless: This is Jersey City,” said Danielle Walker. “Raising the school tax levy will not doom the city. Abstaining from voting on a sustainable budget will doom our kids. It will be an act of defiance, and it acts against our children’s benefit, and it is an attack against our children’s educational journeys.”

“We cannot afford to go backwards to understaffing and underfunded schools, ” parent Meghan Howard-Noveck said. “We cannot go back to the days of doing more with less.”

Tags: Jersey City Education
Share this entry
  • Share on Facebook
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on WhatsApp
  • Share on Pinterest
  • Share on LinkedIn
You might also like
New Private High School to Open Next Fall in Newport
McNair Academic High School Jersey City Moving to Wealth-Based Admissions at McNair and Infinity: A Student Reports
Jersey City Board of Education Special Meeting July 15 2021 Jersey City BOE Wrestles with McNair and Infinity Admissions
Child with face mask Here are the Exceptions to Governor Murphy’s School Mask Mandate
William L. Dickinson High School Jersey City Nine Candidates Vie for Three School Board Seats
Menstrual Products Fighting “Period Poverty,” Program to Provide Students with Menstrual Products
Dickinson High School Jersey City School Board Candidate Forum Goes Ahead without “Change for Children” Slate
NJCU Jersey City NJCU Faculty Look to Topple President

Latest Articles

Jersey City Patrol Car
May 14, 2022 /

Op Ed: Jersey City Cops Struggle with Low Pay and a High Cost of Living

lauren-and-alexa-hoyer-anonymous-architectures_mana-contemporary-exhibition-lauren-silberman-dancefloor
May 13, 2022 /

“Land of the Free” sizzles at MANA Contemporary

U.S. Attorney sign
May 12, 2022 /

Repeat Offender Arrested for Possession of Child Pornography

Crime Scene Tape
May 12, 2022 /

Man Pleads Guilty in Heights Stabbing Death

Anthony Tamburro
May 12, 2022 /

This Weekend

CONTACT US

    ADS/INFO

    For information on advertising opportunities, please contact - ads@jcitytimes.com

    For information on writing opportunities, please contact - info@jcitytimes.com

    Download our media kit here

    ABOUT US

    About Jersey City Times

    Contact Jersey City Times

    Social

    Archives

    • May 2022
    • April 2022
    • March 2022
    • February 2022
    • January 2022
    • December 2021
    • November 2021
    • October 2021
    • September 2021
    • August 2021
    • July 2021
    • June 2021
    Copyright © 2020 JCityTimes.com. All Rights Reserved - powered by Enfold WordPress Theme
    Gilmore and Local Groups File Suit to Invalidate New Ward Map January 22, 2022 Ward Commission Hearing Jersey City Police Car West Orange Man Arrested in November Bergen-Lafayette Homicide
    Scroll to top