SOMA taxes

Do you have a proposal? We are all already aware of theproblem.

As for solutions, as I mentioned, giving each student in New Jersey the same amount of state aid would help South Orange much more than most towns, simply because our taxes are higher than most. It would be a great relief to seniors especially. So how about some discussion of it, South Orange and Maplewood officials?

As for other ways to increase our senior ranks and stabilize school enrollment -- remember that nearly 60 cents out of every dollar in S. Orange property taxes goes to the schools -- would be for the state legislature to expand those eligible for the senior tax freeze. Currently it requires married couples to make no more than $70,000 in annual income, including Social Security and pensions. I often say that most South Orange senior homeowners cannot afford to pay their property taxes with incomes less than $70,000, making it a catch-22 for us, and effectively freezing us out of the tax freeze. The state has to understand how important it is to keep seniors from leaving the state, since they do not tax the schools, being empty nesters. Yet our legislators have more than once made it harder to qualify for the program, which is why few seniors in South Orange are eligible. Our public officials could push for expanded eligibility in towns such as ours where the property taxes are excessive.

Lastly, we could as a town create more opportunity for seniors to share their homes to meet expenses, especially in situations involving a widow or widower who lives alone. How about involving a nonprofit to match senior homeowners with worthy prospects, especially fellow South Orange residents who want to continue to live here but need a place to stay.

These are a few ideas. The important thing to focus on is the loss of seniors, how it is hurting all South Orange residents, including school children, and how this is the overriding senior issue here.

TomR

It's shocking that some homeowners don't understand how property taxes are calculated.

FilmCarp said:

deanielsen said:

OUCH! We just got our property assessment for 2017, AND IT IS 39% HIGHER THAN THE ONE FOR 2016! We assume this means that our taxes will increase by at least $7000 this year (from a base of $16,500). How can we afford to live in Maplewood any longer? Has anyone else experienced such a drastic increase in assessed home value? What could account for it? We will clearly want to submit an assessment appeal. Any advice on what to say and how?

Here is some back of the envelope math. Double check me, I am not perfect. If your taxes were 16,500, and the rate was about .036, your previous value was about 458,000. if your assessment is 39% higher than the 458,000, your value is now 637,000. Using the new rate of .028, your new tax bill would be 17,838. the increase would be 1,300.

By all means, run the numbers yourself.

commongooder said:

Hi, I'd just like to say that it is important to look at the big picture in discussing property taxes. In South Orange, yes, we get little state funding for our public school students. Much more goes to urban districts. If, as our governor has proposed, every student in the state got the same amount of state aid, the average property tax in South Orange would drop by $3,750. Certainly one can be against the plan. What shocks me, however, is how our local officials in South Orange and Maplewood have not uttered a peep about the proposal. On selfish grounds alone -- meaning what would benefit our kids and every property owner -- you would think they would at least discuss the issue.

I would also like to share the link between the drop in senior population and the increase in school enrollment over the past few decades. South Orange, right now, has 30% less seniors than the state average for municipalities. Every time a senior homeowner moves out, a family with kids moves in. This contributes in large part to a 15% increase in South Orange Maplewood school district enrollment. Right now we have a state-mandate cap on the school district budget, so the effect of that increased enrollment is not felt as much. The district has had to tighten its belt for a decade. But eventually there will be a price to pay for not trying to stabilize enrollment, and already the increased enrollment is having an effect in that it means less of the budget goes to the the kids presently in our schools as more come in. South Orange has to help seniors help South Orange by addressing the number one reason that forces them out -- property taxes. (BOLD & iTALICS ADDED)

I had thought that enrollment increases were taken into account when preparing a budget proposal. Add a child to a section and it presents no need for a budget adjustment. Add ten children to a section; and I would expect a need for another instructor, if not breaking the section into two sections. In either event we need more instructors. I had thought that such scenarios allowed for budget adjustments outside the State mandated caps. I could be wrong; and if so, please correct my misapprehension.

With regard to commongooder's comments that the Two Towns should do more to lessen the senior exodus from the Towns, I hail the proposal.

Every empty-nest families, what up & leave, because of taxes, (or for whatever reason) puts a residence on the market which is soon typically occupied by those married-with-kids; or those couples planning on children.

Suggested solutions to halt the senior exodus will be addressed as they are proposed; but keep in mind that the seniors we force out, because of taxes, are the people who can help their younger neighbors with cutting, sweating and joining soft pipe; or hard pipe (less the sweating but adding the threading). Some of us know Homeowner electrical skills, basic plumbing skills (can you install a kitchen faucet?) Can you install a lockset? Can you replace an electrical outlet or switch; or install a new one, in a new location? A sump pump? Can you evacuate the water from your basement while your sump ain't pumpng?

In the event of a perceived emergency; would you drop your four-to-thirteen year olds on the porch of the twenty-eight-year-old-next-door-couple you barely know; or the 50 or 60 year olds who have watched your kids grow from infancy, and never demonstrated anything but care and concern for them.

They know stuff about why your tomatoes are green, or yellow. Why basil grows and parsley doesn't. Why a paint works on the West side of your home, but not the East or South.

Someone once told me "it takes a village". I don't think they were speaking of a village lacking in wizened elders.

But this is about taxes.

So in all fairness, I readily admit that I'd be willing to head to Salt lake City or San Diego the moment the Lovely Bride decides to pull the pin.

It was more than several years ago that I started paying more, annually, in school taxes; than I paid in tuition throughout High School, college and grad school. Somehow, that just strikes me as alarming.

TomR

The above poster is correct in stating that the exodus of empty nesters from our community contributes heavily to an increase in school district portion of our real property taxes. SOMA Two Towns For All Ages was created specifically to address the problem of seniors leaving Maplewood and South Orange in large numbers. The Local Steering Committee of this organization is always looking for additional volunteers to work on this issue. Three working subcommittees of this organization are currently focused on infrastructure, communication, and community involvement.

South Orange has a Seniors Advisory Committee that has been working on this issue for some time. The newly established Maplewood Seniors Advisory Committee has also been charged with this aim. High taxes is a key problem to retaining Seniors, especially once they retire or lose the income of a deceased spouse; but it is not the only reason that we are seeing an exodus of older residents once their children are grown. There are other factors that need to be addressed such as growing inability of Seniors to handle stairs, perform home maintenance, get around town once they can no longer drive, etc. Three to five bedroom homes may be a bit too large for older residents, especially if they are living alone. Some Seniors leave town because they no longer feel a part of the fabric of a community which places so much social emphasis on families with young children. Other Seniors leave town to be closer to grown children and grandchildren.

The towns also have a problem in losing recently graduated young adults in large numbers because of inadequate affordable housing and social activities for this population. Like our Senior population, these young persons who grew up in our towns are generally empty nesters who have not yet started their own families and who would therefore not be in immediate need of sending children to the school system.

What seems to be implied here is that in an effort to control taxes we need to retain seniors by lowering their taxes and/or increasing services to them. I get the connection between empty nesters and burden on the schools and have no desire to see residents leave their lifelong homes due to costs, but this just seems like suspect policy to me. The result would be shifting the burden to the family / younger residents who are already here. Wouldn't the result be the same for these families if the empty nesters sell and a new family comes and adds to the school population? I also want to point out that all of the new rental construction in town is not a solution to this problem. Sure it makes it possible for empty nesters in larger homes to downsize and remain in town, but the end result (pertaining to the school system) is the same: their larger home becomes occupied with a new family

A few thoughts (one long posting, while I drink my coffee)

1. Tax breaks to seniors (as others have pointed out) are still tax losses to the system. Whether a senior sells to a younger family or gets a tax reduction, it does cause strain on the school budget. Those of us with kids in the schools sometimes have huge financial burdens of our own (mortgage, retirement savings, college savings, high medical costs, elderly parents, career disruptions)...are people suggesting parallel programs to keep the most economically stressed younger families in town, or is your concern only for seniors with inadequate cash-flow or savings?

I applaud the Senior Advisory Committee activities that Joan Crystal describes...we should keep doing much to make our communities attractive to elders who want to keep living here, but I personally draw the line at new age-specific property tax breaks, even though they might profit me in fewer years than I like to admit.

2. I suspect that the tax-stability school-funding goal should be to have as many homeowners as possible spend a decade or more in their homes outside of the child-rearing years. Historically, those years were mostly after children left the nest, but with changes in fertility patterns, more than a few of us are living here for years before having our first child. We lived here and paid taxes on our home for about a decade before our first-born entered the school system, and that counts toward the goal of demographic stability.

3. Tom R paints a beautiful picture of the value of seniors to the neighborhood, but the older seniors who were our nearest neighbors during our young homeowner days didn't fit that pattern. They were extreme elderly, essentially living isolated with in-home elder care and no neighborhood participation. I'm sure it was meaningful to both of them to be able to die in their homes, but it wasn't neighborhood building. I'm sure some seniors are amazing neighbors, but so are some young childless singles or couples, and I found Tom R's disdain for younger childless neighbors simply odd.

When we moved here in 1996, we were literally the only young couples on our block (our biggest neighborhood concern at the time!). There was a huge turnover of homes in the wake of Midtown Direct, and I think we are still settling back toward equilibrium after the real estate boom driven by the arrival of direct NYC commutes.

4. Tax codes involve decisions about what to subsidize. Personally, I don't believe it is important to subsidize the ability of seniors to stay in large single-family homes. I think that keeping your family home in retirement is a luxury, to be earned by careful saving and planning, if it is what you want. Most seniors in my extended family have eventually downsized for both financial and home-maintenance reasons, and I fully expect to do the same someday. My hope is that we will continue the thoughtful development of both senior-friendly and young adult commuter-friendly housing so that we have great choices here in town (keeping PILOTs as low as possible, so that they are net contributors to our schools). If you go into Gaslight, The Newstead or the The Top, you will see that they are home to many seniors, as well as many childless commuters, and very few school-children.

5. Finally, I'm angered by people who raised their children in our community, used our schools, and happily profited from the property taxes of their elders, who, now that THEIR children are grown and done with the schools, want to change the societal equation in order to get a tax break. The generation before you helped pay to educate your kids. I expect you to help pay to educate mine. I expect to pay to help educate the generation that comes after. I will live within my means and pay my taxes rather than trying to short-change my debt to the next generation. I might be paying tax on a condo or via rent rather than owning my maintenance-intensive old home, but I won't be asking to shift my tax burden to younger families by partially removing my home from the tax base.

We need to take this energy and use it at the state and national level to figure out how to protect and fix school funding, rather than just fighting over who has to pay the bills here.

Where did I mention tax subsidies? Tax subsidies of a sort already exist for low income Seniors. Qualifying household income was just reduced from $80,000 per year to $70,000. Those who meet this income threshhold can have their real property taxes frozen. I won't go into the particulars here but a query at Town Hall or an Internet search should produce the particulars. There are some Seniors in town who have been able to remain in their homes only because of this program.

There are ways other than tax subsidies to lower housing costs for Seniors without placing a further burden on younger neighbors. One possibility (not presently permitted in Maplewood) is to allow for shared housing, in which a Senior could rent one or more rooms in their house and use the income towards paying their real property taxes. Some Seniors in town would be very interested in doing this. Other alternatives exist and are well worth examining.

As Seniors become less able to perform even simple tasks such as changing a light bulb (due to difficulty with ladders), home maintenance costs can become prohibitive when viewed in addition to real property tax costs. Helping Seniors with home maintenance, either through providing a network of volunteers who could help by performing simple tasks Seniors can no longer perform for themselves or by providing a directory of professionals who would perform needed work at a negotiated Senior rate could give just the needed boost to enable Seniors to remain in their homes, while keeping property values up in the surrounding neighborhood. Applying the power of group purchasing to such an arrangement could make it feasible for such professionals. A combination of these two approaches would go a long way to helping Seniors remain in their homes.

Tom_R said:

commongooder said:

Hi, I'd just like to say that it is important to look at the big picture in discussing property taxes. In South Orange, yes, we get little state funding for our public school students. Much more goes to urban districts. If, as our governor has proposed, every student in the state got the same amount of state aid, the average property tax in South Orange would drop by $3,750. Certainly one can be against the plan. What shocks me, however, is how our local officials in South Orange and Maplewood have not uttered a peep about the proposal. On selfish grounds alone -- meaning what would benefit our kids and every property owner -- you would think they would at least discuss the issue.

I would also like to share the link between the drop in senior population and the increase in school enrollment over the past few decades. South Orange, right now, has 30% less seniors than the state average for municipalities. Every time a senior homeowner moves out, a family with kids moves in. This contributes in large part to a 15% increase in South Orange Maplewood school district enrollment. Right now we have a state-mandate cap on the school district budget, so the effect of that increased enrollment is not felt as much. The district has had to tighten its belt for a decade. But eventually there will be a price to pay for not trying to stabilize enrollment, and already the increased enrollment is having an effect in that it means less of the budget goes to the the kids presently in our schools as more come in. South Orange has to help seniors help South Orange by addressing the number one reason that forces them out -- property taxes. (BOLD & iTALICS ADDED)

I had thought that enrollment increases were taken into account when preparing a budget proposal. Add a child to a section and it presents no need for a budget adjustment. Add ten children to a section; and I would expect a need for another instructor, if not breaking the section into two sections. In either event we need more instructors. I had thought that such scenarios allowed for budget adjustments outside the State mandated caps. I could be wrong; and if so, please correct my misapprehension.

Yes, a BOE gets an adjustment to the tax cap if its enrollment increases. Red Bank Boro and Chesterfield, for instance, have passed 10% increases in their school tax levies in order to budgetarily accommodate their growing populations. The SOMSD's population increases by 1-2%, so we get adjustments too, just not as large.

However, if a BOE feels that its residents are overtaxed as it is it is unlikely to pass a large tax increase. Some BOEs, like Paterson, Brooklawn, and Irvington have gone years without passing _any_ increase in their school taxes.

In theory, the state's school funding law - SFRA - would give a non-Adjustment Aid district more money if its population increases, but SFRA is not an operating law. The SOMSD has had a 15% student population increase and hasn't gotten any new money and there are districts who have grown even more than we have.

Since the state is broke and all new state revenue goes in the PHD costs of Pensions, Healthcare, and Debt, the prospect of NJ fairly funding schools through spending significantly more is very low. That's why redistributing aid (which Steve Sweeney wants to do as well as gubernatorial candidates Jack Ciattarelli, Ray Lesniak, and Kim Guadagno) is so important.

Joan, I promise that my frustration is not with you! Sorry if that wasn't clear. As I said, I applaud the activities of the Senior Advisory Committees.

susan1014 said:...and I found Tom R's disdain for younger childless neighbors simply odd. ...

Where did I express such disdain?

TomR

Seeing a trend of 5% annual increases (doubling every 14 years), I expected that we would need to leave Maplewood after ten years. That's what we did.