Dear Editor:
John Heliker, in a letter to the Reporter (Nov. 24), is worried that the ongoing tax-revaluation is just another plot by City Hall to bilk taxpayers, not being content with booting cars and writing parking tickets to raise money. Heliker is right to be worried, considering where taxpayer money goes.
Here’s one place: On page 12 of the same issue, a Hoboken cop won a 100K lawsuit that claimed he was discriminated against because of his color. He also claims that co-workers posed for pictures wearing Ku Klux Klan hoods “fashioned from napkins”. This cop, who is only 50 years old but who “has worked in the department for 25 years”, is set to retire on May 1, 2014. One wonders how much his retirement, on top of the 100k, will eventually cost.
That’s not the only money flying out the door of City Hall. The same article says that in 2011 “the city paid three Hispanic officers $2 million to settle a claim that a former lieutenant had allegedly forced them to do work on his house while he wore a Ku Klux Klan hood.”
With such shenanigans and misbehavior and costly settlements (maybe Hoboken needs better lawyers), no wonder City Hall is ravenous for our revenue. Hold on to your wallets.
T. Weed