Comparison of Anti - Nepotism (A/N) Ordinances BTA versus City

The purpose of this memorandum is to illustrate the similarities and differences of the A/N ordinance that the Brigantine Taxpayers Association (BTA) proposed to council in January, 2006 versus the A/N ordinance that City Council adopted in 2001 and revised on 2004.

City of Brigantine Ordinance -
Purpose: To establish a policy for the employment of immediate relatives in order to assure the reality and appearance of fairness in the best interest of the city.

BTA Proposed Ordinance ?
Purpose: Whereas, taxpayers are entitled to know and trust that municipal decisions are made on the basis of merit, in the public interest, and without preferential treatment and public/private conflicts of interest due to family relationships, the City of Brigantine has determined that the goal and practice of good government is promoted by a policy of anti-nepotism.

City of Brigantine Ordinance ?
Policy: It's the City's policy that immediate relatives will not be employed in regular full time or regular part time positions where an employee is in a position of authority to supervise, discipline, or evaluate a relative and where there is a conflict between the City's position and his/her own.

BTA Proposed Ordinance ?
Policy: The City of Brigantine shall not hire any member of the immediate family of these employees: the members of the governing body and all those persons in year-round, non-hourly positions as set forth in the City Salary Ordinance.

The definition of "immediate family" is more inclusive in the BTA Proposed Ordinance than that in the City's Ordinance.

The outstanding difference between the two positions is in the policy restrictions. The BTA proposal specifically mentions the governing body and all the non-union administrators and positions in the Salary Ordinance. The City specifically omits such language.

We believe that this is a critical difference. In essence, the major weakness in the City's ordinance is with its hiring policy; namely, it allows relatives of city employees to be hired as long as they are not in a position to supervise, discipline, or evaluate their relatives.

After reading this comparison, feel free to arrive at your own conclusions.
Regards,
Sam Chatis VP of BTA

Revaluation Meeting

There was a very large turnout of irate taxpayers at the school auditorium on March 15. Many people expressed their dissatisfactions with Tyler Technologies.

Revaluation

Letter to Editor - Beachcomber

What happens next with our revaluation?

Those taxpayers stunned with their tentative assessments of true market value of their properties have taken the 1st step and met with Tyler Technologies/ CL T in an "informal review." Now, we wait to hear from the company to see if changes in the assessments will be made. According to our City administration, it cant do anything legally to reconsider its co l Tact with Tyler until the company's revaluation process is complete.

A contract is a legal binding document. It assigns responsibilities to the signers. There is the expectation that these responsibilities will be done competently and credibly to the satisfaction of all parties, one of which, the City of Brigantine in this case, includes taxpayers. In something as important as the valuing of one's real estate, confidence in the soundness of the process is paramount. Based on Tyler Technologies's job performance in Brigantine, that confidence is lacking.

In addition to the initial errors, the lack of necessary information at the early reviews, since corrected, I see a lack of consistency and a formula in making the assessments. Some properties, used as comparable sales examples, are assessed at less than their recent purchase prices. Some are assessed at more than the purchase prices. There are other examples of problematic assessments that lead to the following questions for the company (all of which I have written to a company manager): How does the company determine an assessment? How does the company define "comparable"? How many comparable properties are used for each assessed property? I was shown three. How much of an area around the assessed property is included for comparable properties? Are they averaged to determine an assessment? I've been told and have read different calendar periods for this revaluation, 2004 and 2005 up to Oct. 1, or three years including 2003. Which is it?

As is obvious also from these questions, communication among the company, the City and the property owners has been less than adequate.

While not exactly linked to job performance, we are dealing with the fact that there is now a slowdown in our real-estate market. The peak has passed. This means being taxed on assessments exceeding true market value.

I think the contract and payment schedule should be reconsidered by City Council with the possibility of re-doing the revaluation and moving the effective date to 2007. Some Council members have said the County is pressuring Brigantine to complete its revaluation. Shouldn't getting credible assessments override the County's pressure?

Other municipalities such as North Wildwood, Egg Harbor City and Strathmere, have had problems with this same company. If City Council was unaware of these problems before, it needs to become aware now and report back to the taxpayers with a proposal to correct an unsatisfactory and unacceptable situation.

The next City Council meeting is at 5:30 p.m., Wednesday, March 15 in the North School Auditorium. Taxpayers, come and continue the discussion about this critical issue.
Sincerely,
Anne H. Phillips

OUCH - revaluation

Brigantine Times
By Tom Morgan

I guess by now everybody has received their new Notice of Property Value that was recently mailed to them by Tyler Technologies CLT.

From what I have been told, if you new tax assessment goes up 400%, your taxes stay the same. Anything over 400% and your taxes are going to go up.

It :teems that the new unofficial average home value here in Brigantine is any-where from $450,000 to $600,000, depending on where you live,

.......Results of the unofficial poll also reveal that new property values in different neighborhoods are also inconsistent as homes in the same areas have large differences in newly assessed value.

Tyler CLT is being paid $600,000 by the City of Brigantine to collect all relevant data from the 9,000

properties in Brigantine and assign, to each property individually, the true market value of that property. This is done by doing a comparative market analysis on all homes sold over the last three years in Brigantine. Right now there are over 700 homes up for sale in Brigantine.......

Many people expressed anger because homes in their neighborhoods were selling
in the $300,000 to $ 350,000 range and their homes were assessed for hundred of thousand dollars more.

...... The biggest concern that residents have is that their taxes will drastically rise.

......Brigantine is not the only municipality that Tyler CLT is doing a re-evaluation for. Tyler CLT did the re-evaluation for Veninor, and they also did the re-evaluation for Upper Township, Middle Township, Dennisville, North Wildwood and Egg Harbor City to name a few.

...... Many residents in North Wildwood have challenged their new assessments. North Wildwood has close to 7,000 properties that were re-evaluated by Tyler CLT. North Wildwood City officials estimate that their town's value has increased from $866 mil-lion dollars to close to $ 3 billion dollars after appeals. According to reports the City of North Wildwood has writ-ten to Tyler CLT demanding to know how they came up with the city's new property values, and have threatened to withhold future payments until they explain their figures and formulas, and answer some questions by the city's finance commit-tee. A group known as the Wildwood Taxpayers association has had over 300 people attend meetings concerning the re-evaluation results.

Central Dispatch Plan

Letter to freeholder Joseph Silipena
Dear Mr. Silipena:

We were very pleased to read the article in The Press of 2/10/06,:"another look at a central dispatch plan". We remember when you spoke about such a plan at one of our general Association meetings several years ago. The BTA supported a central dispatch plan then and still does.

It's surprising that Atlantic County, which prides itself on keeping up with technology and constructive change, is one of only two counties in New Jersey without such a system.

Let's get aboard and do what make sense and saves money. The arguments against it are an expression of unawareness of the capabilities of communication technology and, politically, an expensive, excessive adherence to "home rule".

Please give the enclosed copy to Mr. Rick Mulvihill. Thank you.
Please keep us informed about developments.

Sincerely,Board of Directors

Eminent Domain

On behalf of the Brigantine Taxpayers Association, Anne Phillips presented an Eminent Domain proposal to City Council at its meeting in November. In response to her request, Council passed Resolution 2005 ? 155 on December 7, 2005. In essence, the key clause in the resolution is as follows ....

"WHEREAS, the City Council of the City of Brigantine does not believe that condemnation should be used for taking private property for other then public use."

On behalf of the BTA Board Members and its membership, we applaud Mayor Guenther and City Council Members for passage of this resolution.