City Announces Surplus, One Cent Tax Increase

5/16/18 Council Meeting

By: Joseph L. Kuchie

SOUTH AMBOY – The City of South Amboy approved their 2018 budget at last Wednesday’s city council meeting.

Auditor Gary Higgins reviewed the documents with the council and city residents as part of the mandatory public hearing on the budget. He highlighted key points including a surplus of $2 million and a one cent tax increase.

“You were able to balance the budget off with a 1.1 cent per $100 tax increase this year, so it’s a very minimal tax increase of a little over one penny,” Higgins explained. “Your average home which is assessed at $270,680 will see a tax increase of $30 for municipal purposes only in 2018.”

“It’s a very good job putting this budget together this year,” he continued. “Surplus was approximately $2 million and you provided over $1 million for tax relief this year in order to keep the tax rate at a modest increase of 1.1 cent.”

Councilman Tom Reilly asked Higgins if the city’s consecutive years with a surplus would help South Amboy’s bond rating. 

According to Mayor Henry, the last time the city was rated they received an A3 from Moody’s and an A-1 from S&P, which means the city has a strong capacity to meet its financial commitments. Bond ratings range from AAA – D with AAA being a prime rating and D being in default.

“Unless you want to seek a rating to see where you’re at, they normally don’t come out and re-rate you and upgrade you based on current conditions until such time you’re going to have a permanent financing sale.,” Higgins said. “Based upon my knowledge of this city for the past two decades when we had no surplus and now you have $2 million, I would assume this would lead to an upgrade in the rating.”

“I want to thank [South Amboy CFO] Angel [Albanese], Gary Higgins, and the city council because it’s all a team effort here,” Mayor Henry said. “Working all together we put some additional things into the budget…it came out pretty good. We’ve have had surpluses the last couple of years which we’ve been able to put back into the budget which helps keep taxes at a reasonable rate.”

All members of the council were in attendance for the meeting. The next city council meeting will be held on June 20th at 7:00 p.m.