Progress for the new year – Part I
As 2011 comes to a close and we begin the second half of our first term in office, this administration is proud to bring its mid-term report to the forefront. When we took office in January 2010, our first goal was to bring the community back together and begin to correct some of the mistakes that were made in the past. One of the first things we did was eliminate political retaliation against employees. Not one employee has lost his or her job since we took office. We have made it a priority to have an open-door policy where employees and residents are welcome to stop by with questions or concerns. One way to make this possible was to go from part-time status to a full-time mayor.
We have also maintained our commitment of reestablishing a strong sense of community by bringing back community oriented events such as parades, improving and expanding the summer concerts, and introducing new programs such as the street fair and movies in the park where folks could reunite with friends and neighbors. Many of these events are sponsored solely by our corporate neighbors, which results in substantial savings to our residents.
We have kept our promise to televise council meetings to allow the entire community to see and hear how government is being run in an open public forum. Residents can tune to channel 36 which is being updated with new information on a more appealing screen, or simply click on links on the town website, (www.secaucusnj.org), and watch government in action. Council members discuss old business, bring up new business, and provide a full report on committees. Residents are welcome to bring up concerns during the public comment portion of the meeting and can be assured of an honest answer.
Each committee consists of residents as well as public officials to help resolve issues that are important to all our residents. Since reviving the environmental and shade tree committees, we have planted over 300 new trees in neighborhoods and parks throughout town.We have increased our recycling program and held our first Green Summer festival in our efforts to be one of New Jersey’s sustainable communities. The animal control committee is working hard raising money for the care and well- being of our companion animals as well as making significant changes to the shelter. The animal shelter outreach program has been expanded with a satellite adoption site located at 145 Front St. We also have a committee working hard to help entice a supermarket to come into town. Hopefully we will have some good news to tell you soon.
Another important component of our platform was to restore honesty, integrity, and trust in government. We kept that promise by eliminating all lobbyists and unnecessary consultants and we have kept our commitment to establish a second ambulance. In doing so, we went from a paid EMS service at roughly $600,000 per year with one ambulance to two full time ambulances at no cost to the residents. That’s a savings of over $1 million.
We reorganized the Health Department to include property maintenance and animal control complaints to better address quality of life issues. We hired a new full time administrative assistant to answer calls and appointed an additional health inspector to ensure all inspections are completed. The board of health is active in its goal of raising awareness of all public health related topics.
We also better organized the Finance Department to tighten controls and we have gone over every line of the budget and financial audits over the last several years. To this end, we have identified over $8 million in uncollected fines, fees, and assessments which we will be collecting over the next several years. We have put to good use idle funds from old grants and accounts that would otherwise not be used, to cover the cost of new projects without an added burden to the taxpayer.
The reorganization of the Police Department and Public Works is on the horizon, which should result in a more efficient and enhanced service to the public.
We are pleased to announce that our municipal tax rate has been kept stable for the past two years and we plan to keep it that way for many years to come. Our efforts to hold the line on taxes are working, a difficult task since our town gets very little in state aid. An analysis by the Star Ledger just this past Sunday revealed that Secaucus has the lowest average property tax bill in Hudson County.
By 2013 all of our parks will be upgraded. Shetik Field on County Avenue now accommodates soccer, basketball, softball, Little League, and Tennis Courts. Ivanoski Park on Charles Street, and Nater Park on Koelle Boulevard have also been updated to include new state of the art playground equipment as well as a water park feature.
This year we have received outside funding to construct a beautiful nature playground at Mill Creek Point. Snipes Park off Meadowlands Parkway and Trolley Park, at the end of Paterson Plank Road, two passive parks, will also be completely renovated through that same type of funding. Our plans this year are to add a water park feature and a new playground at Buchmuller Park and Eckel Park on Ninth Street. Both will include a new soft rubber playing surface to prevent injuries.
We also plan to continue to renovate the downtown business district making it more appealing to residents and visitors as well as our merchants. A comprehensive flood control analysis is coming up this year to help solve problems in our flood zone areas including two major capital projects, on Golden and Centre Avenues and Farm Road. We have also seen one of the biggest road improvement projects with more than 16 streetsrepaved to date.
See next week’s edition for more on how the town is moving forward.