[Music] Greg, let me know when you're ready. See you. Let me know when you're ready. Recording in progress. Welcome members of the public to the workshop meeting for the township of Chadam this Tuesday, September 9th, 2025. Uh the the committee has returned
from executive session and I shall affirm that Mr. Lanti has previously uh confirmed that adequate notice has been given. Um, I now ask everyone to rise for the flag of the United States of America and
to the republic for it stands one nation under God indivisibley and justice for all. Mr. Lantia, could you kindly provide guidance for the first hearing of citizens? Yes. And a quick question. I assume that any questions pertaining to the reval
will be taken after the presentation on that. Yes, that's good. Okay. Members of the public are now welcome to come up to the microphone to address the township committee. This is an opportunity for any member of the public to be heard about issues which are not topics scheduled for public
hearings tonight. Those present may step up to the microphone to be heard. If you're watching via Zoom, you may speak during any of the public comment sessions by following the Zoom instructions to raise your hand. Whether in person or online, when you are recognized to speak, please mind the
following procedures. Please say your name, spell your last name, and give the name of your street. You do not need to give your street number. All public comments will be limited to three minutes. Rather than use any of your time answering questions, the township committee will wait until you finish
speaking before responding. There are two public comment sessions on tonight's agenda. Each member of the public will be limited to one comment of up to three minutes during each public comment period. Written comments, if we had actually received any, submitted to
the township clerk before 3 p.m. uh would have been read during the public comment sessions. Written comments are subject to the same guidelines as oral comments. Duplicative written comments may be summarized rather than read in full according to guidelines issued by the New Jersey Division of Local
Government Services. Thank you, Mr. Lanti. We do have a proclamation for this evening. And at this time, um should we see if any of the public wants to come up first? Yeah. Um so at this time, I now invite uh um anyone in the audience should they have a desire to approach the mic,
please do so. Anything about the reval? Any questions on that will be discussed after the reval presentation. This is anything any any topic other than the reval which has will have its
own public hearing. Great. And Mr. Do we have anyone? We do not have any hands raised on Zoom. Great. Thank you very much, Mr. Lanti. So then at this time we do have one proclamation for this evening.
I'm gonna quick bring uh Rachel in as panelist. Miss you are on mute but um you now have the floor. in a second. Thank you. Thank you so much. Ovarian cancer is one
of the deadliest cancers impacting women. Yet, it remains one of the underfunded and least understood. Each year in the United States, nearly 20,000 women are diagnosed and over 10,700 will lose their lives to this disease, a staggering 64% mortality rate. Here in
New Jersey, hundreds of women face this devastating diagnosis each year. Sadly, more than 75% are diagnosed in advanced stages due to vague symptoms and the lack of reliable early detection tests. The five-year survival rate remains below 50% and shockingly that number has
not increased in decades. At age 38, I was diagnosed with stage low 3A lowgrade cyos ovarian cancer or LGSOC. A rare form of ovarian cancer that disproportionately impacts young premenopausal women. This insiduous disease has no standard of care, is
chronic, and experiences an 85% recurrence rate. The impact on my life and my family as a result has been profound. Like many women that face LGFOC, I lost my ability to have biological children with no time or guidance to preserve fertility. Cancer
robbed my husband and I of the dreams we had not yet fulfilled. And these losses still echo through every day of survivorship. As a five-year survivor, it's heart-wrenching to think that I have beaten the odds. But even worse, there are the devastating stories of those who did not. One of them is my
dear friend and first mentee, Jordan, who died last September during ovarian cancer awareness month, just one day after her 33rd birthday. Jordan was vibrant, brilliant, and full of hope. I had the privilege of running the Disney Princess 10K with her last February,
only seven short months prior to her passing. Jordan's last words to me were, "I'm glad you're fighting for awareness of this disease. I just don't have it in me right now." Jordan's death crushed me, but I made her a promise to continue fighting for her and every woman still
waiting for earlier detection, better treatment, and a real chance at survivor. Women like Jordan deserve more. They deserve better. They deserve a future that begins with awareness, which leads to earlier diagnosis, research, resources, and ultimately
survival. And that is why this September I've asked for your leadership. Today is September 9th as we recognize the second annual lowgrade Saras World ovarian cancer day. Thank you for standing for survivors, honoring those we have lost and helping to protect women across
Chattam, New Jersey. Together we can shine a light on this gravely overlooked disease and give hope to the women and families in our communities who need it the most. Thank you, Miss Sacket. This committee Thank you. this committee and certainly this community um certainly recognize the
gravitas of uh the ovarian cancer and what it can has and certainly done to u the lives of individuals uh in this community and and more broadly uh the world. Um I now would like to if I may spend uh two minutes to to read the
proclamation uh ovarian cancer awareness month whereas ov ovarian cancer is the fifth leading cause of cancer related death among women in the United States and the American Cancer Society estimates that in 2025 approximately 20,000 women will be diagnosed with
ovarian cancer and 12,000 will die from the disease nationwide including an estimated 670 new cases and 340 deaths in New Jersey alone. Whereas a woman's life lifetime risk of being diagnosed with ovarian cancer is approximately 1
in 91 and her lifetime risk of dying from the disease is approximately 1 in 143. And whereas due to vague and non-specific symptoms in the absence of a reliably early detection test, the majority of women are diagnosed at stage three or later where the cancer has
already spread beyond the ovaries. And whereas although five-year survival rate for stage one ovarian cancer exceeds 90% only 15% of cases are diagnosed at this early stage for those diagnosed in later stages the 5-year survival rate drops to
a sobering 30% or below. Whereas while screening uh screening tools such as mammograms and pap tests exist for breast and cervical cancers, no equivalent screening test exists for ovarian cancer, making awareness of
symptoms and risk factors essential for early intervention. And whereas increased public education about ovarian cancer can help save lives by promoting earlier diagnosis, supporting access to gynecologic oncology care, and
encouraging research funding for better detection and treatment options. And whereas during the month of September, the township of Chadam joined survivors, families, health care professionals, advocacy organizations, and all those committed to raising awareness,
remembering lives lost, and offering hope for a future with better outcomes and ultimately a cure. Now therefore, I, Mayor Michael Troy, do hereby proclaim September 25 as ovarian cancer awareness month in the township of Chadam, New
Jersey, and encourage all residents to participate in awareness activities, wear teal in support, and engage in conversations that help save lives and support the thousands of families affected by this devastating disease. I thank you for your time, Miss Sacket.
Thank you for joining us. Thank you so much. Mr. Next items being that this is workshop meeting and we try to only take action in these meetings by exception only on things that are extremely timely. That
being said, mayor, there are two items on the agenda resolutions 2025-170 and 2025-171 which are listed for consideration for action. questions. Second, I believe we can vote on these jointly
if you want. Um, yes. So, with regard to resolution 2025-7170, authorizing change order for Blue Loop. Do I have a motion?
I move that uh we authorize the change for the second. Mr. Al Perowitz, yes. Mrs. Ewald, yes. Mr. McHugh, yes. Deputy Mayor Roland, yes. And Mayor Choy, yes.
Motion passes. Thank you, Mr. Okanti. With regard to resolution 2025-171, police sergeant promotion, one motion to adopt said resolution. So move. Do I have a second? I'll second. Thank you.
Mr. Alperitz. Yes. Mrs. Eold. Yes, Mr. McHugh. Yes. Deputy Mayor Roland. Yes. And Mayor Choy. Yes. Motion passes. Thank you, Mr. Lanti. Thank you. Um, at this point, Mayor, we've got
slated on the agenda and as uh mailed to residents and noticed on our website, presentation on the county order townwide tax revaluation. Uh, this evening, we have our tax assessor and members of the firm that have been contracted to do the EV valuation here
to uh offer a presentation. Uh I would ask that we allow them to make their pres presentation uh completely and conclude that and at that point uh you can open that up to questions and answer. I do think the presentation does answer a lot of questions that members
of the public might have. They've been doing this in many municipalities and are very uh wellversed in in the matter can anticipate uh concerns. So with that said, come on up, please.
All right. Can everyone see this presentation right there? Is that good? Does it get bigger? Can we pivot? Are they also on the monitors up there too? Is the presentation on those two monitors?
No, the ones that are hanging up. Now that everyone got together, pivot a little bit more. Can you turn it? Yeah. So, before I do get started, uh, this presentation will be up on our website, so you'll be able to see all the slides. Um, but I'll take you
through it now. Um, is okay if I steal that mouse? Oh, yes. Yeah, you can steal the mouse. We're going to post this. Yes. And, uh, I thank you. Uh, so this meeting is being recorded as well as all of our township committee meetings are. Uh, so for anybody that's uh, here in
the audience and also online, uh, this will be available on the township website through also YouTube. uh and we will make a post about this. So, it will be available and as he just indicated, it's also on your website. Correct. Correct. Which is also linked to uh which is
linked from the township website as well. Thank you. All right. Well, everyone, thank you for having me. Uh my name is Rob Brasha. I work for Appraisal Systems and we're the company that was hired to do this reevaluation process. What I prepared for you tonight is a PowerPoint
presentation on the reevaluation process. So, I'm going to take you through and explain what a reevaluation is, why it needs to be done, and the seven steps uh to that process. The presentation should take about 25 minutes, and then I'll hang around to
answer any and all questions. So, the first thing is what is a revaluation? So, a revaluation is when an outside firm comes into a town and appraises every property in town. So, we're going to inspect and appraise all of the vacant land, commercial,
residential, exempt properties. We're going to appraise those properties as of October 1st of the pre-tax year, bring it up to 100% fair market value, and then the town will use these new values for property tax purposes.
Now, why is the reevaluation being done? Well, very simply, the reevaluation is being done in Chattam because you were ordered to do this. Okay, this was ordered by the state and the county to do this. Now, the reason why they ordered this reevaluation to be done is
because they determined that the assessments in Chadam are not uniform. Okay, so the sole purpose of a revaluation is to make sure that everyone's paying their fair share in taxes and everyone's being treated uniformally. Okay, there used to be this misconception out there that
revaluations were done to raise taxes. That's simply not true. Okay, the sole purpose is to make sure everyone's being treated uniformly and fairly. Like I mentioned, at the end of this process, the township will collect the same amount of money in taxes. Okay, so
basically what happens is the town takes their budget, they take the net taxable value which is all the assessments added up. They divide one factor into another. They come up with a tax rate tax rate and that gets applied uniformly throughout the township.
Now at the end of this process, the net taxable value is going to go up. So the tax rate will get adjusted accordingly. So therefore, the township's going to collect the same amount of taxes, but where that tax dollars from the pie if you will that will change. Okay, so that the taxes from the property owners may
shift and I have an example in the next slide or two. So some of the criteria for why a reevaluation needs to be done is here on this slide. First and foremost is the time between the last reassessment.
So the last reval that was done in Chattam was 1992. Okay? And then there was a reassessment done in 2005. So the last time these assessments were changed were back in 2005. The second criteria that they look for
is the town ratio. Okay, the state and the county would like the ratio to be as close to 100% as possible. And right now the town is at a 72% ratio. So, what that means is that the assessments are about 72% of fair market value. All
right? So, that's a little too low for the state's liking. Um, and then there's a coefficient of deviation. So, the way I like to explain this, just to make the math easier, I'll give you an example. If a property sells for 800,000, but
it's assessed for 400,000, that's a 50% ratio. Okay? So one of the jobs of the assessor is they record all the assessment to sale prices that occur in chat. So if every sale that came across the assessor death desk desk fell at about
50%. The state wouldn't like that because the ratio is low but they would say you know if everyone's coming at 50% that means for the most part people are treated uh uniformally right. But the problem would be is when you get some sales that are
falling at 75% and other sales that are falling at 25%. So in that case you're going to have an average ratio of 50% but that standard deviation is very large. Okay. So when you have that example the properties that are coming in at 75% they're paying too much in
taxes. Whereas the properties that are falling at 25% they're paying too little. Okay. So again, when that starts to happen and the coefficient is saying that that's happening here, what we need to do is bring all the assessments up to
100% their market value. Start over. This way, everyone's going to be paying their fair share. Okay. Now, this is the slide I was talking about. This is what you could expect at the end of the job. I think this slide is really good because it ties
everything in towards the end. So, I'd like to give you an example of just a property right now. Let's just say their assessment on record is $875,000. What's important to remember that that assessment at $875 was an assessment
that was placed on the property back in 2005 almost, you know, 20 years ago. Okay? And there's been a lot of changes in the market since 2005. Now, with a tax rate of 2.104, 104. This property for this year will pay
$18,410 in taxes. Okay. So now your individual property tax implications are solely going to depend on what your property does in relation to the average that takes place
in the entire town. Okay. So if the average increase for the town after the re uh reevaluation is done is 4 times what happens is the tax rate will decrease by that same factor assuming
the budgets are remain neutral. Okay, this is just due to the revaluation. So therefore, if the net taxable value goes up 1.4 times, you would expect going into the following year the tax rate dropped from 2.104
to 1.503. Okay? And that's how the town ends up collecting the same amount of money the following year. Like I said, reval are revenue neutral. Okay. So now what does this mean to your property for the following year? Now I
know that this revaluation is going on for the tax year 2027, but for the example I just put the following year. So for next year, let's say the reval went on for next year. If your property increased to 1.225 million, which is
1.4s four times. In this example, your property is going to remain tax neutral because when you take your new assessment and times it by that new rate of 1.503, when you work out the math, you can see your taxes are basically identical.
Okay? So now, like I said a couple minutes ago, that pie is going to change the property owner slices. Some people are going to go up in taxes and some property owners are going to go down in taxes. So the two examples at the
bottom, if your property increases less than the average increase, you're in line for a tax decrease. As an example number one, if your property increases more than the average, your property is going to be in line for a tax increase.
Okay? So we won't know this till the end of the process but we will share this with you when we have that information. Now by doing a lot of these presentations I usually got a question at this point where people say okay this makes sense.
I understand this but why are we doing this now? It's arguably the height of the market. These values are going to be inflated and if these values are inflated therefore we're going to be paying too much in taxes. So I just created another slide. it looks identical to this to kind of show that
there really isn't a good or a bad time to do a reevaluation. Okay? As long as you pick a specific moment in time, which I mentioned was October 1st of the pre-tax year, it doesn't matter if the market's going up, going down, or staying
neutral. As long as we treat everybody uniformly and fairly at that same standard, we could ensure that everyone's going to be paying their fair share. So, if I just rip through this example real quick, the top is the same where your current assessment's at 875,
you're paying 18,400 in taxes. Let's just say now the net taxable value doubles. Okay? And this would cause a lot of people to get sticker shock when the values go out if this were to happen. But what would happen is the tax rate of
2.104 is going to get cut in half. Okay? Again, this is how they collect the same amount of money. So in this example, the tax rate would go down to a15 1.052. So in this example, if you were assessed
at 875 and you got a value from us saying that your house is now worth 1.75, like I said, that that's sticker shock right there. But again, it all depends on what your property does in relation to the entire town. So again, since in this example, you're going up two times,
your taxes are going to stay the same. And then the same examples apply. If your assessment goes up less than the average, you're going down. If it goes up more than the average, you're going up. Okay? So, that's the rule of thumb. So, that's how this all ties into the end. And this is
what it means for you as the property owner. So, now real briefly, I'd like to take you through the seven steps of the reevaluation process. Most of this presentation is going to be the inspection portion. Okay? So, first and foremost, the the first
step is the inspection. So, couple weeks ago, each property owner received an introduction letter from our company with a brochure, and this kind of announced the kickoff to the reevaluation process. Okay. So, the letter did say an inspector will be
coming to your property between the hours of 9:00 and 5 and they'll be doing the inspection of your property. Now, first and foremost, I want everyone to kind of be aware that all our inspectors will be wearing this
appraisal systems ID that looks exactly like this. Please, under no circumstance, let anyone onto your property that does not have that exact ID. Okay. Um, what we also like to do is
on our website that we mentioned will be linked, we share an Excel spreadsheet that tells you where our inspectors are located. Okay. Now, we do come unannounced to inspect your property. It's just virtually impossible to schedule an appointment with every
property owner. So, what we can do is you could go on our website and like I said on that Excel sheet, you could see when your property has been issued. Okay? And once your has been issued, you could expect an inspector to be to your property probably in the next two to
three weeks. In addition, we tell you what inspector your property was issued to. Okay? So, there's another section on our website that's our staff information sheet. So, like in this case, it would say your property was assigned to Sarah
Hobic, inspector 107. you could click on her staff information sheet and her ID. All her vital stats, car information, everything will be posted on our on our website. Okay. So, we try to give you a little heads up as to who's coming to your property and when.
Now, as far as the inspection, there's two components to the inspection. There's the site inspection and then the actual inspection of your property. The site inspection takes place before the inspector actually steps foot onto your property. He or she is going to look at the surrounding area to see if there's
any influences that would affect your property in a positive or negative way. So, this slide right here just shows how a site influence could affect your property in a positive way. For example, a view um or a view located on a body of water or view of a lake. Those are all
considered positive sight influences. Some examples of negative site influences are in this slide right here. Picture of the top is a beautiful colonial style home, but they have high tension power lines that run right through the backyard. Picture to the
left is a property that's located right next to a railroad track. And the picture on the bottom right is a house that's located on the busy street. Okay, so those would be examples of negative influences. After the site inspection, that's when the inspector will step foot onto your
property. They'll ring your doorbell, announce who they are, and then they're going to measure the outside of your house, measure and sketch all the improvements on the property. This next slide shows what the final product would be. We sketch each house from a bird's eye view. Each section of
the house will be broken out. It'll be labeled so you could see that and it'll tell you how big each section is. So, just real quick, this is your typical Cape Cod style home where the main section of the house is one point one and a half stories over a basement. So, right here, you'll be able to see on
your property record card that this section is one and a half stories with a basement. This section over here to the left is an unfinished attic with a garage. And again, each section will be uh identified on your property record card. As the inspector is walking around your
property, they're going to note the style of your home. This slide just kind of tells you the main types of homes. Um, the style of homes. You got your typical ranch style onetory, your Cape Cod that we just saw, which is typically one and a half stories. You got your
colonial twostory building, your split level, and your B level. The inspector will also take note of the quality and condition of the home. This slide just shows you different types of qualities and conditions. Now, a question that we always get is
since you're coming unannounced, what happens if you're not home during that first visit? And that's okay. That's going to happen more times than not. So, what are inspectors going to do is they're going to try their best to do the site inspection and the exterior inspection. That's the most time consuming portion of the inspection. So,
we want to try to get that done during the first visit when it's still light out. and then when we come back to do the interior inspection, we don't have to bother you for too long. So, what the inspector will do is they're going to leave a card on your door. We simply call this our yellow call back card. And what it's going to do is it's going to
leave a day and a time for a returned visit to do the interior inspection. Now, when we set up these callback appointments, typically we'll do them in the evening between 5 and 7. Reason for that is if we can't catch you home during that first visit during the day,
we're going to assume that you're typically not home during the day, so we're going to come during the evening hours. If we just happen to miss you and you prefer a daytime appointment, there's a number you could call to set up an appointment that's mutually convenient for the inspector and yourself. So, we
do do these appointments during the daytime, at night, and on some weekends. The interior inspection much less time consuming. Typically, it takes about 5 to 10 minutes depending on the size of the house. What the inspector is going to do is walk through all levels of the
house. They're going to know things such as the room count. They're going to look to see what type of heat the house has, whether or not has central air, how many bedrooms, fireplaces, things of that nature. One of the things they'll be looking for is the condition and quality of the
kitchen. Okay. Okay. And this slide just to shows you different types of conditions and qualities of the kitchen. And they're going to do the same for the bathrooms. Okay. So, here's another slide that shows different types of qualities and conditions.
In regards to the basement and attics, the inspectors will be going into the basement. They're looking to see if that area is finished. If so, what is the quality and condition of that finished area? So what makes up a finished basement is
three components, walls, floors and ceilings. So any combination of that that would be considered finished. And then the inspector will say how much percentage wise is finished. So for example, if you have two components that are fully finished, that's a 66%
finished basement. Okay. The same thing is done with the attic area. However, we are only inspecting atticss that have fixed stairs. Okay? So, we're not going into any pull down attics or attics that you need a a ladder to get through. So, it has to have fixed stairs.
Now, if you're not home during that first visit, like I mentioned, we're going to leave that yellow call back card. If we don't hear from you, we're going to assume that that appointment that was on that card was good for you. So, we're going to come during that time. If you're not home again during that time, what we're going to do is
leave another card on your door. And we just call this our blue estimate card. So now at the end of this process, if we do not gain access to the interior of the home, we have to make assumptions. Okay? So what we have to
do, we're obligated to estimate at the highest most reasonable potential. So what we're going to do is we're going to tell you on this card what your home is going to be listed as having if we don't gain entrance to your home by the end of the process. Okay? So it's going to tell you the number of units, number of bats,
heat, central air, quality, overall condition, quality. Okay. So another question I get is what does reasonable potential mean? Um so the example I like to give is if you know you're a small, let's say, 1400 foot
ranch and the house has a basement, it's reasonable to assume the basement's finished. It's also reasonable to assume that the kitchen has been updated and the bathroom has been updated. Okay? It's not reasonable to assume that a400 square foot ranch has six bathrooms. Okay? So, you have to stay within
reason. And once again, we're going to let you know on this card. So, if you come home one evening and you see this card on your door, if the information is incorrect, there's no need to panic. We have inspectors that are going to be out in town for a very long time. Just call the number on the card and we'll send an
inspector out right away. For condos and town houses, the inspection process is exactly the same. There's going to be a site inspection and there's going to be the actual inspection of your property. The only difference is that instead of measuring the individual units, we will rely on
master deeds to get the style, the layout, um, and the size of the unit. We go to every unit. Yeah. Now, step number two is the analyzation part. So, step number one and two happen
at the same time. Okay, so as the inspectors are out in the field collecting all that information, there's appraisers back at the office that are analyzing all that information. Okay, so this is happening at the same time. One of the first things we're going to do is
create a neighborhood map. Okay, so we're going to drive the streets um and we're going to carve up the town into homogeneous neighborhoods because we want to compare similar homes. Okay, this is how we keep uniform and compare similar houses to each other. Okay, this
neighborhood map will be available to you um once step number four comes towards the end of the process. We will post this on this on our website so you could see how we broke the town into different neighborhoods.
Step number three is the review process. Once we analyze all our information and place all our values on the properties, we're going to give it a quick review. And this is where we like to share this information with the property owners. So this brings me to step number four.
Okay. So step number four is when we share the information via a letter to each and every property owner. So before I go any further, this is step number four of the sevenstep process. So when you get your value letter, which would
be sometime, let's say November, December of next year, the values at this point are still very much preliminary. We like to share this information with you and then hear back from you. Okay? So one of the first things we do
once the value letters go out is we update our website with a lot of useful information. So first and foremost that information that I shared with you with those two slides where the net taxable value increased so much and then the predicted rate dropped this much at this
stage we'll have enough information that we could do that for you. Okay. So when we send these letters out, we will be able to come up with a predicted tax rate, assuming budgets stay neutral, just due to the revaluation, what the tax rate would be going forward. So we're going to post that on
our website. Okay? There'll be a tax impact calculator where you'll be able to go online, plug in your old assessment, new assessment, and we'll do the the math for you. So you'll be able to tell if you're in line for a property tax increase, decrease, or you're pretty
much going to stay the same. your neighbors properties if you could just uh sir sorry we appreciate we're going to have time for questions at the end so everybody can have a chance yep thank you so after that tax impact calculator that neighborhood map will be posted okay then underneath that is
we're going to post all the sales that took place usually over two-year sample period and this is very useful so if you're colonial style home that's located in neighborhood one that's 2,000 square feet you'll be able to go on our
website and look at colonial sales that took place in neighborhood one around the same square footage and see what they're selling for. And if we have you assessed, let's just say for a million dollars and they're selling for uh 900 to 1.1, you'll then have the confidence
to know that your property is assessed for what it's selling for. So you'll have the confidence that your assessment is correct. Um and the last thing that we post because we are very big on transparency is uh all the assessments. Okay, so that
actually works very well. Sometimes homeowners have a difficult time finding a good comparable sale or maybe a good comparable sale doesn't exist, but property owners know their street pretty well. And you'll be able to compare your assessment with your neighbor's assessment. And again, that
works pretty well because I just give the example. If you know your house is better than the person to the left, but the person to the right has a nicer house than you, bigger house, you should expect that your assessment falls somewhere in between those two. Okay? So again, we we supply all this information for you.
Now, at this time after we post all this information, if you're having trouble navigating our website or you're not understanding it, you'll have the opportunity to meet with a qualified representative from our company to go over your assessment. First and foremost, we'll go over your property
record card, make sure that all the objective data that was collected is correct. Then that representative will go over all the sales that took place and the assessments and we'll answer any and all questions that you have and we'll tell you how we came up with that assessment.
Once all those meetings are done, we collect all that information from the property owners. We do one last review. Then that brings up to step number six where the information will be turned over to the town and the county. At this point,
those assessments will become final for the 2027 tax year. Okay? But what I always like to say, nothing's ever written in stone. If you continue to disagree with your assessment at this point after meeting with us, you could always file an appeal, which is step
number seven um to the Morris County Board of Taxation. Okay? You're entitled to file an appeal every year. So, that doesn't change. The only difference is is in a typical year, the deadline to file an appeal is April 1st. Since
you're going through a reval for 2027, they'll extend the deadline by 30 days. So, you have to May 1st to file an appeal. All right. And that concludes the seven steps of the revaluation process and I would be happy to answer any and all questions.
If if I may just provide a little bit of uh guidelines for the members of the public and thank you very much for coming out this evening. Uh it is important um this is a significant endeavor that the township is is taking on. So we wanted to uh set up an environment uh where we have uh this
evening session and a subsequent session later in the month at our next community meeting should you desire to come to that phone for additional information. uh for this evening, if I may respectfully ask um to present uh to offer up questions to our professional
uh only. Uh in the event you have a co comment or an opinion you'd like to share, we do have a second hearing with citizens this evening as part of our meeting and we'd be delighted to entertain um your statements at that time. But we do have professionals um who've got a number of things on their
docket. We want to be respectful of their time. We certainly want to be respectful of the other members of the public uh time who are here this evening. So again, if I may just respectfully ask uh to present questions at this time for our professional with regard to uh the presentation that was
uh put forth this evening. Um and again there is a second hearing of citizens. We certainly uh want to provide ample opportunity for you to share your uh thoughts or questions questions right now, thoughts or opinions or comments later on this
evening. Thank you all. And when asking questions, please give your name and what street you live on. Uh mayor, before we move to the public, sorry, uh one topic wasn't covered and I was just wondering if they could address that briefly. How are commercial
properties and uh rental residential properties handled in the reval? Sure. So uh residential there's three uh approaches to value. There's a sales approach, cost approach and income approach. So sales rule in uh both cases
for residential we rely on the sales approach and the cost approach to come up with value. for um commercial we're going to rely on the income approach to value the properties. So we will take a look at the uh income uh data and uh
work it out that way. Mary add also um so there is another presentation so if anybody wants again it's online but we are going to have another presentation that will be on uh Rob that is Thursday September 25th 25th
25th uh and if someone does not have an opportunity to ask a question this evening how can they get a hold of you yes so you could call our office at 2014938530 one more time 2011 493 8530. If you don't get a chance to ask it
today or a question comes to mind later, you can also contact them. Um the firm was hired through public bidding process based on their expertise and their knowledge and their performance throughout the state. And so that's why they're the ones doing this. So again, as the clerk indicated, please state
your name and address and Daddy Burchill. Thank you for the presentation. It was very informative. So in as you know, there's a lot of new construction. Uh, so my question is in terms of the reval, if you're in a neighborhood, say as I am, um, and as
the mayor is, of colonials, um, and they are, whereas new homes are put in at two or sometimes three times value. How does that affect? And just to be clear, are you an older home? Uh, 72.
Okay. So, we carve up the town into neighborhoods, right? And that's going to be the basis for our land values. Okay? Then each house is valued separately. So, if you're an older home, you're not going to be compared to those newer homes.
Okay. Thank you. You're welcome. I guess I have a couple of questions. Sure. tried to scratch them down. Um I guess from the outset I was just curious who is funding this entire know
that your firm is going to manage it but where are the funds coming from accomplish uh so uh the funds are actually coming from taxpayers. There's only one place where we can raise money and that all of
our budget comes from taxpayers. Um we When we were notified of the order from the county to do this, uh what we did was immediately start to take preparation steps to give us some time. Uh tax revaluations are one of the items
that the state allows us to do what's known as a special emergency appropriation. So, this governing body at several public meetings, I believe it was last year, did that. What that allows us to do is split the cost of the whole process over
five years. Uh and so it's not just this firm that uh has expenses associated with it. We also have to update our tax maps and the tax map process was handled by our engineer. So the cost of the tax map preparation and the updates as well as the uh actual inspection and
appraisal process were all estimated and then we went out to bid. We confirmed those numbers. We authorized them. uh we did a special emergency appropriation and that uh is split up amongst five years budget. So starting in 2026 and
30 as a tax then uh it's not an additional tax. It is an item that we have to budget for in our taxes. So that's something that we take into consideration. we have to balance our budget. We have to make sure that the tax levy does not exceed a certain
amount. So in areas uh you know so making sure that it's fitting within the budget um and you know some things have to give some things we're not able to afford and some things we are forced to pay for by the state by the county.
I mean just well I think he's referring to the assessments themselves assessments. So as he explained yes revenue neutral right so we we have budget that we prepare uh and it's not just us one thing I wanted to clarify
that you know Rob was mentioning the town we collect taxes but we collect taxes for the county and for the schools and for the library as wellum is a very small portion of all of that, but we we're the collector for all those taxes.
So, I guess another question I had as you were going through some of the examples as we walk through the steps. So, um I guess maybe it's just the vocabulary that quite clear on but
you talked about a lot about the revaluations right and ultimately you'll post new mail valuations to all taxpayers but I think from my perspective and going back to your examples
the rates are really what's what's critical right because it doesn't matter to me if my homes from 800 What's important is what that that ratio that multiplier coefficient what have
you is right is that that's the tax that's going to really be assessed to so yeah I I think I understand what you're saying so and I understand this with with property owners I think the most important thing to a property owner is your tax implications right um I'm a
taxpayer too I I get it um but for a revaluation it's to make sure everyone's paying their fair share So, we really aren't concerned with taxes, although we know that's your biggest concern. We're going to try to help you with that. But, we are concerned with the value. And so, when that value increases, we want to make
sure you're getting treated fairly and uniformally with the rest of the town. But yes, you won't know the implications until those rates come out and what that increase is of that net taxable value. So, in effect, and I understand, you know, maybe this is a question more for
the committee than for you because I understand labor happening here, right? But at the end of the day, the change in valuation doesn't really tell me a whole lot, right? That rate is what I'm I'm after.
And I don't know when I'm going to see that until will it be, you know, when my 2026 or 2027. So if this goes on So if this goes on for the 2027 tax year, you're going to be paying a full year
worth of taxes based on our assessment. Now, in any given year, this isn't my area, but I I understand it. You pay taxes on the first two quarter based on last year's assessment. So my understanding is that's not going to change. Then the tax rate will come out
in the summer of 2027 and then you'll the third and fourth quarter they'll readjust so your total equals the total amount paid on the new assessment. I sort of get it but I guess at the end of the day when you talked about sort of
disputing valuation so that's a good that's a good question. So when you file an appeal you can't appeal your taxes can only appeal your assessment. So if you feel your assessment's too high you would have to file an appeal and use comparable sales to prove that
the assessment's too high. And is there a comp process people? It's just whatever that new tax bill is is what it is. So that assessments, right? So as he explained, we go through a public
hearing process and go through a very arduous and transparent public process when it comes to the budget. Our budget as a county, the schools and the library, they all do the same. set the budgets and as he explained we look at the budgets a tax rate is set and that
tax rate is multiplied against the assessments and that's what determines how much you're paying tax but so we can't predict 2027's budget just as we can't predict 26's budget we try to do as much as we can for long-term planning
and all but we by state law we do budget year to year and so when that budget is adopted and all those entities entities adopt their budgets and then they certify their tax rates, then you'll be able to know exactly how much in
property taxes you pay. However, those property taxes are going to be based on the tax rate multiplied against the assessment. So, you can only really dispute the assessment. Uh the process by which you could maybe dispute the rate is through participation in budget
processes at each of those entities. So, the county you're not the county budget going up. If you're not happy with the town budget going up, school budget going up, the library budget going up, you would go to each individual taxing entity to participate in that public process of the budget setting and budget
adoption uh to convince them to do otherwise. But other other than that, it's we don't look at the tax assessment valuation and say, well, we're going to maximize or minimize our taxes. We have obligations, police department, public
works, sewer, engineering, all these different things that we have to pay for to provide the services for the residents. And we try to do it with as little fluff and as little uh room for increases because we want to keep that tax neutral as much as possible.
I understand. I guess let me try and clarify just I think I I think I get what you're getting at to help this question. Um, I understand what he's saying that the valuation tells you nothing because you don't know where you are relative to everybody else, right? The only thing I've heard is that I can dispute the valuation, but in in
isolation that doesn't help me because it doesn't inform me how much how much my taxes may go up or how Yeah. Unlike, but that's kind of the stat. But if we know townwide, so for example, if we know townwide everybody went up
50%. but you went up 65% then chances are your taxes are going to go up. If you everybody went up 50% and your valuation only went up 25% then relatively speaking your taxes probably will go down. So so I think it's that relative to where the town is which I
assume that information would come out also that we don't have to calculate that that residents will know that townwide the valuation went up x% and then you individually went up you know y% and then you could see where you are relative to everybody else. I think that's the only other information we have available.
It seems reasonable. I guess it just seems to me like rather than just disputing valuation, having that information that you just described would, I think, you know, motivate me more to carry out a dispute, right? Because then
I'd have at least a sort of trend sense of where I was going, right? So again, I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And we'll if I wasn't clear at that step number four when we send you the property values like I said they're preliminary at that point
because we are going to be available to have discussions about it and at that point we will know where the net taxable value is going. So we will be able to predict and estimate it. It's not going to be official but we will be able to give you a very good idea if you're going up down or staying the same. And
by how much? Yeah. I mean again I didn't get that from what you said earlier. I apologize. I just wanted to ask one or two more things. The um
the notion that we were out of kilter in terms of the assessments. If I understood it properly, I thought I heard that it was largely based on sales information. Is that correct?
Correct. Okay. So, and it's how the sales compared to the existing assessments. Oh, the uh as you were going through the steps, you know, you talked about um a number of things including, you know,
these neighborhood maps and as important, you know, the I guess blueprint of the home, exterior, interior, etc. Do these things exist? Is there a reference point for you to
compare against? I recognize that people can build additions and so in itself even if the information is not available from a prior process, you know, there's, you know, is there any basis on that or
is it purely, you know, what we find out now. It's what we find out now. So, we we start from scratch, but obviously there are existing records. So, if we need to research it or look something up, we certainly can, but we are starting from
scratch. Do these exist anywhere? These your property record card. Sure. Absolutely. All right. Thank you very much. Hi, Moren Kelly, Mountain Avenue. I have
a question um about land. Uh chiefly, um everybody's um assessment shows uh two items. It shows land and it shows improvements. Um, so my question is,
is the value of a given amount of land the same all around the town or does it depend on where you've carved out a particular neighborhood? I mean, in my case, in it happens that the land is more valuable than the improvements. Um
and and I realize that's a little unusual uh for Chadam Township, but just wondering I mean it seems me every all over the place we're creating the vacant land by tearing down the existing house. Um and so I didn't know whether like if
you're a quarter acre, you're a half acre, you're a full acre, is it a set amount or is it all depend on where in the township it is? It it's a great question. That's where most of the value comes from in most of our analysis. Great question. Um so each
property in a given neighborhood will have the same land formula not the same land value, same land formula. Okay. So each neighborhood will be treated differently with the land and the sales will indicate what land's worth in a
given neighborhood. As you mentioned, we're going to look at vacant land sales. A lot of times there aren't that many. So what we'll look for is tear down sales that you mentioned. I I'm sure everyone know tear down. You know, you see the house sold, you drive by a week later, it's knocked down. That property
was purchased for the land. So, we could take that information and figure out what lands worth. Now, I may be getting in the weeds with this, but what we typically do is two components to the land within a given neighborhood. So, you got your site value and then your
price per acre. Okay? So, real quickly, the way I explain a site value in a given neighborhood is that's kind of like your buy into the neighborhood. I like to use a builder for example. If a builder came into a neighborhood and the simple fact that that lot met
the zoning requirements and it could support a site, meaning they could put a house on it. Right off the top of their head, they could say that lot is worth x amount of dollars just for the simple fact that they could put a house on it. That's your site value. So that's going to be consistent for that entire neighborhood. Now, as you mentioned,
every lot is not the same size. So we'll value then in addition to the site value on a price per acre. Okay. Usually we value the zoning requirement and then everything else after that is
an excess value. Let let me explain. So let's say you live in an acre zone to make it simple. That first acre is what's really important. That's the land that you need to support that site. Anything after that acre, it's nice to have a big lot, nice
backyard, but you don't need that land to support the site. So, that's typically valued at a lesser rate than the top acre. That's not getting into if the land could be subdivided. Like I said, this is this is where all our analysis comes from. Um, but in a nutshell, to answer your question, so
each neighborhood is treated differently and Yeah, there's a lot that goes into the land valuation. So, so the couple things come to to mind. I mean, there are streets um in Chattam Township that don't have any street lights. They don't have any curbs. Um
very few storm sewers and, you know, rarely get paved. You know, that that kind of thing. And you kind of wonder if if if it's you know, if that's if that's taken into consideration. Absolutely. And we're going to look at the sales to see if that supports it. So those are site influences. So I gave you
examples of like the examples that everyone's really familiar with. But if your property does have one of these influences, you would see an adjustment on that land formula, whether it's 5% off, 10%. So all that will be on the property record card. And I know we're
speaking general, but once the values are placed, we'll be happy to go through all these items with So, there's an application in the neighborhood for someone who has two acres and wants to subdivide it, but they're looking for a lot of variances. I I don't know what a um and this reval is coming up maybe
before that's decided. I don't know. Do they factor in potential? I mean, it's probably worth more to the seller if it's actually two two separate buildable lots than one. And I don't know if that factors in. I said, so you said you
still have to go through variances. So the approvals aren't set. So we value as of in this case October 1, 2026. Okay. So whatever is in place at that time is how we have to value it. Okay. But but then would you look at potential of a of a property? Just what
what's there? Just what's there? Not it could things change in the future. The assessor has tools to change it going forward. But we can't value based on potential or what may happen. Okay. We have to value as of October 1st of the pre-tax year. All right. Thank you.
You're very welcome. Hi, Amal Shenpike. She had one of my questions. I just have quick questions. Um, what percentage of the houses do you expect to not that you're not going to
go into? And how many of those houses do you think you underestimate what is actually there? Good question. I mean, um, it's hard to say. We're going to do everything we can to get inside as many
homes as possible. I hope to get into 80 or 90%. You know, uh, only time will tell on that, being totally honest with you. Now, we estimate at the highest most reasonable potential. So my anticipation
is we're either going to be right on with our estimates or we're going to be over and therefore the property owner will have an incentive to call us to let us in. Does that make sense? Yeah. I'm just asking if that's your practice like Yes. Okay.
Because sorry to cut you off. So case law backs that process up where you have to or you're obligated to value the highest most reasonable potential. And the reason for that is as you're mentioned, if 80 to 90% of the property
owners cooperate with the process, we have to give them the assurance that no advantage will be gained by not cooperating with the process. So that's exactly what I was trying to get to. Perfect. Um, how much is newness influencing assessment? So what's new? five years
ago, 10 years ago or last year when you're looking at floor basement finishings and you had given examples about kitchens and bathrooms. How what is the determination of that spectrum? It's it's subjective but a great
question. Um we judge everything your conditioning and your quality based on the age of the home. Okay. So let's I like to use the example let's say your house was built in 1960.
We're walking into that house thinking of what a typical 1960s house would look like. So, we're not comparing your kitchen and bathrooms to a brand new house that has a brand new kitchen and quality of bathroom. So, if we walk into
your 1960s house and it's your typical kitchen, your typical bathrooms, we consider that average. Now the assumption is that kitchens and bathrooms and maintenance has to take place over time. It's called deferred maintenance. So if
you you if you just replace your kitchen and you don't go above and beyond, that's not what we're looking for. That's still typical for the 1960s home. We're looking for the extremes. The example where you see a kitchen that looks like it belongs in a house that
was just built in 2024 or a kitchen or a bathroom that's not really function and that it's old. It needs to be replaced. If you were to buy that home, one of the first things you would do is replace the kitchen or bathroom. So, we're looking for the extremes relative to the year built. Does that make sense? Yeah. Okay.
And my last question is on transparency. So, can we, and I'm just ignorant on like tax and stuff here, but can we see what current property values are now and what neighborhood lines are now so that when we get our reports at stage 4, we kind
of know what the delta is across the township. It's all publicly available on the county's tax department website. Um, are the lines drawn on that as well or you drawing them? We're draw we're drawing them brand new.
Um, as far as the old assessments, yes, we do post the old and the new assessment at that step. So that would be on our website. That's like done at the time. So we have to do our own homework. Nope. We'll have that for but to answer your
question is public record. You do and then the drawing of the neighborhood lines. Can you just give us a sense of how you do that? Sure. Like what influences? So the first thing we usually start with is the zoning. Okay. That's a great starting point
because if you really don't want to have a neighborhood split with zoning. So if one zoning requires a half an acre per site and another zone has an acre, those right off the bat would be two separate neighborhoods because they're not similar. So we start with like the zoning map. That's like our base. And
then within each zone, we typically just carve it up based on sales. Uh like this is a lot a lot of times like uh a nice barrier railroad or um Main Street.
It's it's really it's part of the whole appraisal practice. It's hard like that's what we're going to be doing over the next year. Um so when you publish this, we'll get to see the new map. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. You're welcome. Hi, my name is Matt D. I live on
Mitchell Avenue. I had two what I hope were quick questions. When you mentioned negative influences, I was curious given the great swamp being within in some ways part of chat tent. Is that considered a negative influence or not? Is that factor?
I'm not criticizing the swamp. I don't It's great. It's wonderful. Well, I just you didn't know if that counted like a high tension wire or not, you know. Yeah. So, yes. I mean, we would probably that the sales would reflect that influence over writing. Does that make
sense? No. Um, let me make sure my understanding and if I'm wrong about this, I apologize, but my understanding is like sometimes floor plans can't be changed, footprints can't be changed because you're touching the
great swamp or, you know, you talked about, you know, the livability or sight ability. If you're closer to the swamp, there's more animals, more bugs, more things like that. Those could be conceived as perceived value differences in and a negative. I'm just curious if that goes into the calculation or is
that like nope, not our problem. It's hard to answer. I have a pretty good guess whether it would or not, but we have to see the sales and do the analysis first. Okay. So, it runs up the numbers. Okay. Correct. And then and we will tell you that at step number four. So, but that would be something that
would be part of like an appeal process if you not even but that would be something you would see on your property record as well. you had a land adjustment X for this purpose. Okay. And then the other one was you said when in terms of basements and attics, you're not going into any attics for those pull downs.
If there is something up there that you think would be material to the value of the house, can you request someone go up there and look at it or are you just kind of stuck? Yeah, sure. Why not? Yeah, I mean uh
typically those aren't um calculated into the square footage, so we don't go up there. But yeah, absolutely. If there's anything that you want to show the inspector, I would say yes. Um they have a tablet with them. Uh we take exterior photos. We don't take
interior photos unless the homeowner requests that. So that would be an example. If you do have something like that, yes, have them see if they could peek up, take a picture. Absolutely. When they come in, just say, "I want to show you this." And they'll know. They'll know. But the reason why I was hesitating, they're not going to go into
house and say, "Hey, open that up for me." Yeah. No, totally fine. That makes sense. Thanks very much. So, Reval Cedar Lane, um, just from a high view perspective, what what there's re-evaluation, there's reassessment. Can
you the difference and what the implications of each are like. Does one factor into the other and and explain that? Honestly, there really is no difference between a reevaluation and a reassessment when it comes to the scope of the work. Um the detail is exactly
the same. The easy way to explain this is that for a revaluation uh outside firm is hired to have control over the process and the assessor aids
in the process whereas in a reassessment the assessor is the bosses if you will. they are in charge and then an outside firm could be hired to aid the assessor in the reassessment. Other than that,
the process of how it gets done is like then in the analysis it's the same. So I guess my question is now that we're up for re-evaluation, does that set the base value for the reassessments to speak?
I don't understand that question. Sorry. So, what's the You're saying that there's a re-evaluation. So, are they one of the same? They're one of the same. A lot of a lot a lot of people use those terms interchangeably. Okay. And then the second question is
you mentioned you're going to be uploading a lot of information to your website, but rather than having to remember put a calendar tickler, is there is the town going to announce that some updates have material updates have been posted to your website or Yeah. So,
Right now, what's going to be posted throughout now and probably for the next year is just the inspector locations and the status of where our inspectors are. Once we send those preliminary values out, that's when the website turns over and that's when we post everything.
Okay? So, we you'll you'll know that by the letter. Okay. But I'm sure that I'm going to assume the town's going to make contact with the firm. So as they progress through the different stages we will know and you know both their
website as it gets updated will also make similar updates. Okay to website my house is somebody pay me a million and a half dollars to knock it down. How do you evaluate your property? My house is worth nothing.
I mean the example you were given is that the the land to build an allocation will probably be heavy in the land and again I'm just going off of your assumption right now. We haven't done the assumption in fact rolling hill people are buying houses for buying
house like mine at split level for a million half dollars knocking it down. Yeah, I mean there there are a million and a half dollars. My house is worth zero. So why do you want to come into my house? It's a great question, but uh yeah, listen, so within a within a
neighborhood, there could be a situation where the land is heavily weighted um and there's less importance on the the improvement, but if we don't get in, we still have to make those assumptions. So there will be a difference if you have
two identical homes, one both typical condition, if you will. We get into one and not the other. We're going to have to make assumptions. So the house is worth if if there h I I hear what you're
saying, but if there's a structure on it, it's worth something. If you don't determine whether or not I have no problem with somebody coming into the house. That's not an issue. That's not an issue. Getting into the
house is not an issue. Don't put words. The question is how do you evaluate it? There's I think there are three houses. Father Kevin lives in one house number six and there are three other houses on
Robert people are leaving you know notes in our mailbox knocking on the door all the time. So if the fact is that it's worth a million and a half dollars knocked down my house, how do you evaluate the property?
It's not. Yeah. I I think I So hopefully if we both agree your your house or your property is worth a million five. Is that what you said? Yeah. Your final assessment your final somebody just put a house up on 2.1
which is right. Yes. So, uh, your your house's final value should be around5 and the land will be heavily weighted in that scenario. I can't give you the break rent down right now. That's that's going to take place over the next uh 14
to 16 months. The other thing is this, but I'm appalled that the wash your hands all this attention as the ratables in the town go up and they will go up. We're going to pay a
larger share of the county tax and a larger share of the school tax and that's not been addressed at all. And I don't know what I don't know what this is costing. You didn't say that what this whole thing is costing but I don't know what the rush is to to comply with
the the county's direct. So what are they going to sue us? Yeah. We're not washing our hands. This isn't necessarily a bad thing. This is This is a bad thing because our school taxes our shares are time for questions
for right now. We can do commentary later but right now this is an opportunity for questions. Can I do a commentary later now at the end of presentation? Yeah, there's an opportunity comments questions for our professional firm about the
name Cedar Lane. I just wanted to clarify the September 23rd meeting. Is this the same presentation? Uh September 25th. Yeah. So that comes Thursday. So we wanted to provide some variety because tonight's Tuesday uh and this meeting, but we we also record
these to provide some variety Tuesday. So that one's going to be on a Thursday slightly later time, but it is essentially the same exact presentation. Make it and again there's questions after for them you can contact them separately and will be online as well.
Thank you. Do we have an actual timeline of like when uh maybe I missed this of I understand when the tax rates will go into effect but the timeline of when the assessments are starting or evaluation process is
beginning ballpark. So just to make sure I understood the terminology. So the inspections will start shortly. The inspections will probably go through till next year. Okay. That that was pretty much the question. Okay. So, start starting
the inspection the next month, two months. Yeah. And and just to the the person that will be coming to the property is an inspector collecting data. They are not the appraisers. They are not the person that's putting the value on the home.
Okay. I'm probably um I am very concerned. I'm hitting the senior citizen age and I'm wondering a couple things. Um thinking of other seniors in this town where said knockowns are going to 1.5.
There's head hunters all the time at our properties. Um, do you have any data or any information about how these have impacted towns and seniors from your
other towns? Well, I mean, we assess the property based on what it's worth, how it's occupied. Um, to answer your question, no. No, we wouldn't have that. curious about that. Um, how much Chadam has had a lot of
trees knocked down. There's a lot of open space. Uh, people are selling their open land, knocking trees down. There's over by Green Village. I think there's one that's seven acres. They're probably knocking down trees instead of the town
buying this open space to preserve the situation of the town. The old river road is knocked down. This is a comment I know. But it does impact the quality of life in this town. And I'm wondering how does that factor into your assessment? In my
opinion, Chad has although you have big houses, the quality of life in this town has come down because all the trees would not. So how does that factor in? If it does play a factor, um, it would show up in the sales.
So there's no quality. It's all based on correct. If if properties are selling for 1.5 in a given neighborhood, you would expect the fair market value of that property to be 1.5. If there's influences that are going down going on
that affects the sale price by 10% and lowers the sale prices, we would see that, recognize it, and base our assessments on those sales. So, we look at the sales closest to October 1st of the pre-tax year. Um
so what you're said so any influence would be seen in the sales that are taking place and I know that taxes someone mentioned you know school does their budget county does their budget state their
budget two things you mentioned the state mandated this somebody else mentioned county so who mandated it and what public sorry mandated that or voted on Uh the order comes from both.
So there's a state statute that governs how this process goes and sets the rules statewide and then the county tax board reviews municipality situations within and then they county tax enters an order
and it's conjunction with the state. Not just they voted in appointed. Um, when you do these, it's supposed to be revenue revenue neutral.
When you do this, do you see a bell curve that 25% will go up, 50% stay the same and 25% go down? Is there any kind of data like that? It's different for every town. We'll have that at the, you know, probably step four. We'll know how many properties are going up, down, and
staying the same. Is there I mean, you found this Uh, a lot of people use a rule of thumb of a third, a third, a third. That doesn't always hold true. Um, but that that that would be a good rule of thumb. A third go up, a third go down, a third
stay the same. There's no data from the company or the town has assessed that various people. We have we have data on every town. That doesn't necessarily mean that it's going to happen here. We'll have that data
once the assessments are completed. I'm just wonder how that plays out. Chad and Burough went through the process last year. I think it was about a third a third. I I think in in the spirit of um trying
to answer questions, um we're we're trying to allow for our professionals to give you facts and uh some guidance as to what the process. They haven't done the work yet and that work will commence shortly. So I I would
I would um I would take less stock in in a professional giving you an assumption um or a prediction because at the end of the day he hasn't started the work for the township while he has done numerous other municipalities there are some
differences. So I I I can appreciate his reluctance to say, "Well, gee, this is what I think your talent's because then now now he's making a statement that not necessarily based on facts or any work that he's conducted to this point. So um
I, you know, I appreciate a a sense of anxiety because this is a this is a townwide massive effort. Uh we're talking about taxes. Um yeah, so I I appreciate it's not lost on the committee, right? Um and so what we're trying to do is uh provide venues where you can get
your questions answered. Um and candidly not every question can be answered because the work hasn't been done yet. So so at the back end of this once the work has been done uh what's been communicated is you have uh uh avenues to pursue in the event you want you feel
differently about how how the product end product came about. I'm referencing the appeals, the ability to go to the professional and have I think you make yourselves available for uh conference, sit down, what have you for absolutely dialogue, right? So, we have the bandwidth and we're willing
and able to meet with every property owner in town. We do these uh meetings over the phone, in person, we could do it virtually. So, we'll we make ourselves available to meet and go over the property record card and how we came up with the assessment on each property.
Just one more question. Ami Patel Shanpai. Okay. Sorry, I don't mean to assume the worst of system and gaming, but I haven't done other gaming question. So, you're going to start assessments now and you go all the way till October next year, correct?
Or not assessments, but evaluations. I think you're just to make inspections. Inspections. Sorry. Inspections. Let's get vocabulary correct. So, inspection. What is the township doing to ensure that people that have construction plans in place and improvements and tear downs
like say I get my house inspected tomorrow am I done and then I can go and improve my house? No because the assumption is you're taking out of we work with the assessor. So yes so we we always do audit your own work and that's the
question we go back if so first and foremost if there's work being done when the inspector is there we tag it to go back to closer to October 1st to see what work has been completed. In addition to that, we also um research
any permits that been taken out to see what work has been done and whether that work is completed. I really appreciate the time and the forum. You're welcome. Um I have a one other question too. Um, so for homeowners who are not residents,
maybe they're on extended vacations, maybe they live in different states, uh, and you provided a couple opportunities to be at their property, they're not at their property. You're understandably you're going to the highest reasonable
potential. Um, I guess how many steps for them to be to allow you in to their homes because they may want for you to do that. Um opportunities for do that even if
honestly plenty of opportunities. We never pull the inspectors out. So all the way up until step number six until the information is turned over, we have inspectors in the field. So we'll we'll do inspections after that letter, that preliminary letter goes out and during
our informal meetings. We're still doing inspections. And quite frankly, we do get into a lot more interior uh after those values go out. So, they'll have a lot of opportunity. And listen, if there's special cases where they know they're going to be on an
extended uh vacation or something, if they call their office, call our office, um we could try to schedule an appointment at a time that they're home. Your name again? Just to pick up on what you said, I mean, as we've been talking about this
process at some level, feels like something that probably a lot of us just recently went through to plumbing and I don't know what else what anybody else's experience was. This is as much
as do you but it was there was very poor communication you know I think it was put out you know hopefully with the best of intentions but you know so much of these days is, you know,
press X for this and so forth, right? And I I went through very difficult time and then when I finally got through, I had multiple people returning to my house even after they had inspected my pipes and at some level there's a
parallel here, right? So, I guess I just want to understand that, you know, because the township, you know, ultimately has has, you know, is the greatest beneficiary of all this. Who would we be dealing with? Is it with
this gentleman's term? Is there some reports to go back to the township if we're getting this sort of we're not getting the communication that sounds like it's going to play out as smoothly as you describe? Who is there a hierarchy or are we entirely left to our
own devices to kind of, you know, sort our own frustrations? How Sure. Um well, I would imagine that uh the vendor would have some uh information made available, telephone numbers, uh
points of contact, individuals that you can reach out to. Um and at the end of the day, we are here for you. You can certainly reach out to us. You can reach out to Mr. Shahadi. Our information is on the township website. Uh and part of what we're here to do is advocate for
you. So if you have uh a a um if you are having a challenge or issues uh please do bring that to our attention uh and we will take it up the appropriate flag ples Mr. Shotti and and township staff. I think it would to highlight that right
because you know I'm not saying it's going to play out the same way but sure it's it's got you know some strong parallels to what you know many of us just went through and you know I don't want to sound like a martyr but at the
end of the day it feels more and more that we as individuals are being asked to chase down people and it feels like you know obviously in good faith I assume I make the call or make the connection everything will resolve itself but my experience hasn't been
that so I just think it would be useful if it's this gentleman here to to call him out as somebody to maybe not make the first call to but to We're having difficulty, you know, what do they say the definition of insanity, right? If I keep calling results, I'm
going to look to you to grease the wheels a little bit, right? You know, if it's an isolated taxpayer, obviously that could be a break, but if you're getting enough of this information, I'm just looking for somebody else. So, this is just a nuance, right? The
pipe inspections, that's the water company, right? That's like you dealing with Toyota, Ford, Verizon, Comcast. We have nothing to do with utility companies. They are not our vendor. They are your their customer. Uh we have no
involvement with utility companies. This is different. This is a vendor that we've hired on your behalf on behalf of the township that answers to us. Um and they are here to work for us, but for you collectively as taxpayers because what they're doing even though
there's frustration people like the going up, my assessment is going down. They're doing this for the benefit of the township and every taxpayer to make sure that everybody is paying their fair share, that it's uniform, that it's done consistently, so that way the taxes are properties are assessed correctly. Uh so
they are here for our benefit, for your benefit, if they're there's any issues with them, and I don't believe there's going to be any issues with them, uh because they've worked out a lot of kinks in other municipalities, but if there are any issues, you are always welcome to I am the one who's responsible for ensuring that any
contracts this governing body awards are executed and handled appropriately. Now the tax assessor over there is Glenn Wave, right? Glenn, he's the department head who handles the assessor's department. You can always reach out to him and if there's issues there's always
me as well. I just want I would like a point of contact, right? I don't want to have to go to different people as you pointed out you awarded the contract and I get it right. It's a different entity. You have no connection to I brought it up
simply because many of the the same, right? Inspectors come to the house, they leave the card, they come back, you know, but it's there's no real middle person between you and the utility company, right? So whereas here the we are the entity. So as I said, right, because we
did post something on our website about this, there was a letter that went out and the person that signed that letter is right there and the number at the top of the letter was his number and his information on that letter head. Uh and that is the tax assessor, right? So it was our on that letter with contact
information for the vendor and then we did put something out on the website that did again provide that information right down at the bottom left hand side but you said you want us to give a point of contact we mailed out that point of contact and it's on the website and
again his contact information my contact information on the website Anybody can email me. My email address is administratorship.org. Uh again for anybody that's watching administratorship.org. Our website is cadamcountship.org and my
phone number direct line 973 635 3212 973 6353212. So if there's any issues do not hesitate please. All right. All I'm asking for is the transparency. So I do see
But I don't make believe that you're the guy that I need to contact if I can't get any satisfaction with clarify that. I would say simply as a matter of steps the vendor would be the first point of contact and I'm sure they'll avail themselves. It's their expectation and
there's their their standard to avail themselves as part of the process. Um and if you uh feel you reach an unsatisfactory point, put all five books here. Okay. including I recognize I'm glad you brought it up because
ultimately you are processing may not be necessary. I now invite anyone else uh to microphone should they have any questions for our professionals regarding the presentation. We do not have anyone else. Uh thank you very much. Um is there anything else that you like
anyone online? Yes, Mr. Lanti. Do we have any hands raised online? Uh let me check. No, we don't have any hands raised online. Great. Can I just ask one last quick question? Um, how long when an inspector comes in,
how long should we expect them to take uh for the inspection to take? It it honestly depends on the size of the house. The exterior is more time consuming. Uh the interior is usually about 5 to 15 minutes. Um once they get
into the inside of your home, they're not taking any measurements. They're just really doing a walk around uh and taking notes about the property, about the house, I should say. Okay. So, on average 10 minutes or so, any members other members of the
committee? Thank you. Questions. Anything else, Stacy? I'm good. Thanks. Thank you. Um, if there's nothing else uh from appraisals, this was
okay. Great. Uh, Mr. Shotti, I I now seek your counsel. Um we do have a full docket here before we get to the second hearing of citizens. U in light of that fact and and understanding that we have a res with a squarely with a qu uh with
some statements to be made. How would you how might you suggest we handle that? Is there possibility to front it and um offer that platform up? Sure. But although I do think that I mean mayor you certainly have number
of citizens if you'd like. Uh but at this point, are we Yes. You guys are they're good to go. Thank you for having me. Thank you very much for your time, your presentation. And mayor, are we keeping it at this point to uh general comments on this specific item? I'm sorry.
Are we keeping it to uh comments on this particular particular item only? Yes. Yeah. Yeah. and we'll reserve any other comments uh or statements not related to uh the revaluation during the second hearing of citizens as a statement. Uh so then at this time uh if there are
any statements uh by members of the public that would like to you'd like to be made uh with in connection to the reevaluation uh that was just covered uh please do come before the microphone. Yeah. Okay. Great.
Welcome to my house built seven years old living in Chatt 36 years. Whether my house is in the same shape the original bathrooms or original kitchen was when it was built or not
makes no difference. And there's when I say you're washing your hands up, the fact is that our county tax rate is going to go up because our big share
get a bigger share of the school tax. So you push by rushing into this. I don't rushing into what that means. Not saying you know what like some towns are saying we're not
going to build affordable housing. We have always complied with our requirements but this is one time when you are pushing senior citizens out and there's no doubt about it because
you know my taxes are going to go up. I'm going to be the one that goes up because some of that is willing to pay exorbitant amount of money for a piece of property and squash a big house on it
and sell it for $4 million. So guess how much is this costing? I want to say total with everything the tax maps and I mean I want to estimate it's on our website
about 700 tax and 750 the last thing I was handed a piece of paper when it came in gentleman says tax rate is 27%
a politician that you in all due respect I think if our tax bills went up 27% doing we are doing something terri Yes that's correct well I mean so it's not the bill yes and this is the bouch
so you would you would uh I would dispute the facts on that sheet of paper so those aren't correct what what what percentage did that taxes go up Well sir there's many ways you can analyze how much tax went up individually right but you can look at it individually you can look at it as a
tax rate you can look at it there's so many that question is a very loaded question I'd be happy to meet with you and I can only no no it is a loaded question if you know more than me about it then why don't you tell me sir if you know more about it than me then why are you asking me the question I'm
giving you the fact the I'm telling you I I do but you're saying over 20 years Mr. Cert and I can go over all of those
numbers with you. I'm being very nice. Okay, sir. I Mr. Shotti, if I may, I I'm trying to stay focused on uh on the matter at hand, which is the assessment. I understand your question. uh has to do
with uh I guess municipal uh municipal tax portion of it. Um if you'd like more information on it certainly can anybody answer that question? How much is the rate of on the municipal tax portion?
I would have to kindly offer to you sir to meet with you to give you that information. I don't want to meet Okay. Well then I give you that information. When I was on a township committee and the mayor, I could tell you how much the rate went up over the six years that I was on the township committ.
It's a simple question and it's it's again I I can't I can't I find it hard to believe that none of you can say what the tax rate has gone up with last year. Not even a guess. It's not a loaded question. It's just somebody handed me a
piece of paper said the rate went up 27%. You say he's a politician. He's a Republican. was a Republican. I didn't say that. No, I said Okay. You said you said that. So, you're putting words in my mouth. I didn't say that. No, I not talking to you. I'm talking to you say the average increase across the
board last year was possibly $200 a year. What percentage? How much did the tax go up over the last three years? Few years ago, it didn't go up at all. Over the last three years, how much tax
rate go up. I don't care. A few years ago when I was on the tax committee, one year went up zero. I would love I I Yeah, I think I think part of the problem again one year went up 7%. It does not I So the total I from my recollection,
right, was was a few percentage points for the total. I I'm not sure what that 27% is, but um I'd be happy to take a look at it and get you whatever information you need. But again as I I would if you would like to um make
additional statements please reserve them for secondary my question. Yeah but I would like to answer your u I would like to respond to some of the statements you made again with regard to the assessment. Right. How about how about we start with what happens tax go over the last three years.
Yeah I think under as I said I'm not answer that question at this point because I don't want to give incorrect information. I'm happy to meet you with I can get you. I think the we don't track things by, you know, three years, four year. We we we don't have that was a random request and we don't have the three-year number,
you know, and we can go back certainly and provide any numbers and provide an explanation as to what was going on over the course of those that time period. I will address, you know, specifically when you came up when you on the on the topic of where we started the
topic of the reval and the impacts on the reval. I absolutely feel your pain on that. We're looking at the same thing that those are our are uh we have an older house uh and the values in the community have gone up dramatically. You could just look at Zillow and you know get a sense of that the whole idea is to
bring it up to market and I understand what you're saying relative to other county. My husband keeps complaining about it too. And what I tell him is think of it the other way is that for the last five years at least, we've been over that 80% uh um criteria that would cause us to
have a reval and it's been about five years that they finally came around and said you've got to get this done and now it's not even going to implement till 2027. So in some respects those of us who are going to go up have been saving. I know it's not going to give you any peace of mind but that's the offset. The
reality is it's bringing everybody to a to a a a market value to a level place a fair place relative at the county level relative within Chattam Township and it's going to be painful for some of us but that's what it's been doing. So really the offset is that everybody else
was subsidizing us for the last few years. Again didn't satisfy my husband. I'm sure it's not going to satisfy a lot of others but that's the reality. And to your earlier comments about um uh what you believe to be the price of
your home relative to the value of your uh property relative to uh the improvements on that. Um I think part of the way um part of the way that's addressed is by looking at the
neighborhoods. So I think they're trying to cluster uh like-minded homes, like-minded dynamics to homes uh in the same subpool in order for them to run whatever whatever algorithm there is amongst likeminded
like like characteristic homes or at least the similar dynamics that are going on with that bundle of homes. I think that's part of the process for which they would would address things that are going on for for example in your neighborhood like you said rolling hills. Um so I think that they they
it is a practice and a process that I think been refined de over decades and I think they understand um the the notion of knockown home values. I think they understand that uh homes are being bigger so built bigger. So I think they have a process in place by which u I
think they'll address some of some of your concerns. Um, and I think at the end of the day, I I appreciate, gee, well, my my home, you sort of uh uh sort of metaphorically reference your home being worth nothing and your lots a
million and a half. Um, I might look at it the other way and say, well, gee, the land values appreciably. That is ultimately a good thing. I I wouldn't submit to you, I think townwide, home values have been going up because I think there's lots of it's a
it's a very desirable place to live. There are people coming in here wanting to buy homes which are elevating prices because the school systems are robust. I think it's it's an appealing community for uh for folks to live to raise
families uh perhaps even to retire. I'm not sure. But it appears to me that there's certainly demand supply and balances. A lot of people want to live here uh within the fixed stock of homes that we've got. Hence land values andor property values are appreciated. um that
that may be a small way to address your statement about well gee my my my uh my lot's worth a million bucks my home's worth nothing it's it's a very valuable lot uh and it's it's become that because it's a very desirable place to live
I think at the end of the day the process uh is it's going to be multi-year long uh as professional stated um there is going to be some constrnation. There's going to be some anxiety because I think it invol clearly
involves inspectors entering people's homes. They're they're collecting data and I think at the end of the day before we and we're all looking for answers. I think the professional was trying to be uh diplomatic and trying to respond to everyone as best he can. But at the end
of the day, he doesn't really have some of the answers that the public members of the public are seeking because the work hasn't been done yet. I think you can give some guidelines based on what you've seen in the past, but nothing can certainly be anchored to what may or may not happen in the township until the work is done. And I think part of what
they do is make it all available once it is done so that people can scrutinize it. Uh, and I think it sounds like it's tabulated organized in a way that might facilitate those efforts. Um, and by the way, if there's a u a disagreement,
there are ways for which you can uh elevate that. You can reach out to professionals. There are other other pathways you can pursue to to uh challenge the uh the assessment or the process because whether I let them in or not
whether I do or not. Yeah, that that may or may not be true, but I think to my earlier point, and that's why they're looking at you theoretically, I think based on what I heard and uh the process that they're doing is they're going to be looking at a particular home, in this case, your
home, relative to other homes that are going through those same dynamics, right? Yeah. They're not going to be looking at your home and another home, you know, five acre home in Green Village, for example. That's why they're clustered together. That's why they do it in neighborhoods. five acres.
I understand it's a little bit apples or just which is why I think they do do it by clusters neighborhoods. There's an understanding that they're trying to they're trying to group together or bundle together like-minded homes or like-minded uh you know moving
parts or dynamics to the homes in that particular group or neighborhood. Right. That that way it makes sense. When you all say can strike their school. But we're going to pay more taxes.
Something we should make everybody aware up our percentage of county and school tax. Well, the the information uh if anyone would like that information, we can certainly
uh provide the precise information and whatever supporting details they would like um you can reach out to any one of us or Mr. and we can we can adjust that for you in a way that's satisfactory. Um if there's any other member of the
public would like to come forward with any statements or comments, please do so. Otherwise, I will close matter uh on the assessment itself and we shall move on to the next item on the agenda. Mr. Shotti, thank you. The reports first one under
administration uh we do have a Um the request for fire prevention fee update ordinance. We have our fire marshal, our fire official here with uh the subject matter expert next to him.
She is the uh she's the technical assistant in the construction office, but also the administrative assistant as well to that office. Have a seat up here. Thank you. Um so in the agenda packet was a memo uh that explained the request
in more detail. Uh it reviewed surrounding communities and also provided an analysis of the uh work that's involved and why the justification for that fee update which hasn't been updated in a
very long time. So Mr. our fire official is here with Christine Morgan if there's any questions. Welcome. Thanks for having us. Uh and similar to what we did with the
construction fee review, um this is an opportunity to you know take into consideration his request uh which will help not only the office and the township but also the residents uh in some ways because there are some provisions here that would be allowed
that are not currently in such as uh sort of last minute emergency requests, people want inspections, um how to deal with reinspections and additional inspections, all that there. Uh based on this conversation tonight, we would then have our township attorney
work with our staff to draft an ordinance for additional review later on, but this is to give us some guidance, staff and professional team on how to proceed. Would you like to give any information or would you like to show any questions?
Yeah, but to help out for questions to amongst committee members. Long overdue. Yeah, I mean I I think it was a good breakdown with all of the different comparisons of the other towns and everything. It left little questions in
my mind as the result of that. So, thank you for the thorough reporting. Um I actually don't have any questions and they're all within state guidelines as well. I think this will be a tremendous
service to the community. Um, as you know, this is a very desirable community and when something comes on the market, homes are turning over quickly, sometimes in a very short period of time and they don't have the ability, they get frustrated if they can't have an
inspection uh less than two weeks. So this will give the ability for those individuals as a service to be able to have the official to go out to do those inspections less than two weeks and sometimes in three days which will be
very nice. I can speak to that. I think they'll be very happy res often times we we look at these things in in a vacuum. So we do generally ask for ualize it and cases like this is always
very helpful to come up with a matrix if you will of similar or exact fees across different municipalities. So that gives us a better way to understand the numbers that we're looking at.
So that's most appreciative. Thank you. The initial inspection comes with a reinspection is Is that what I read? No, the reinspection is okay.
I think the old state the old may have stated that I think the reinspection is just if they fail the initial inspection. Yes. Right. I'm sorry. That's what I the initial Sorry, I
we give them enough information so we hope See, this is why make sure you guys prepare. Oh my god. I I do want to give tremendous credit to Jimine and Tracy in the office and also
Greg help preparing this. So, thank you very much. Thank you. Sorry, you couldn't have covered that in the beginning. We tried. Thank you. Thank you for having us. Thanks.
Good night. Thank you. Have a good night. Thank you, Mr. Shotty on. Thank you. Next order of business. Okay. Um, so coming up in the next uh meeting or two will be reviewing the employee handbook. Uh finalizing that
with the uh labor attorney that is an update that we do every two years in accordance with our uh joint insurance fund guidelines and recommendations. Um I will have a draft for you hopefully by the next agenda meeting. So it'll be in
review executive session if necessary and then hopefully resolution in October. Um any questions on that though? Okay. We do have a need for resolution at next meeting to authorize two settlement agreements related to
opioid settlements. These are uh national and statewide settlements. Uh we are party too. Um we were a party to years ago opted in. Not every municipality qualifies also to be part
of these but we do. We've been a member of some other settlement agreements and have been deriving some uh grant monies as a result of that. These are two. One of them is settlement agreement with Purdue and another one is conglomerate a number of other pharma companies. Our
attorney is reviewing the agreements. They are sort of standard agreements that uh really don't have much flexibility for us, but they dictate how we can participate and the timelines and what we are allowed and not allowed to do with those funds once they are
received. No, I can um if anyone wants to know, I can tell you the manufacturers that the second um settlement is with uh Alen, analex, hikma,
indivin sun and zidos. So that's the secondage. Questions on that. Um the other item is our economy pool end of season report was provided in the
packet. uh it outlined uh membership revenues received and other uh operations expenses. Any questions related to that? And I will add we have a survey uh every year at least since I've been here. I can't speak to before that but we can do the survey
immediately at the close of the season. We provide uh members till the end of the month to respond. uh and then we'll collect those responses provide you with the tabulation as well as the full uh detail of the responses that should be available in October workshop packet.
Are there any questions on the report? Thank you. Uh under the clerk's uh section we uh received a report from the clerk. Uh I don't believe there are any questions on that anything there. Uh we will discuss
uh health department contract uh in executive session. Uh but I will add uh that we are anticipating because the contract we did I believe it was an 18-month contract when the agreement with uh Bergen I'm sorry with Bloomfield
terminated. We entered into an 18month contract with Union Township for that shared service that ends at the end of this year. So we're trying to uh beat that uh end and have some next agreement uh to immediately succeed that. So
hopefully in the next two to three months we will have a resolution to authorize an agreement for health department services uh under construction. Um our attorney and our construction official are still uh working together. It's a very comprehensive ordinance update that we
reviewed a few months ago. Uh so there's a lot of work to be done on that. Uh most likely we will be introducing that in January uh because there's a lot of work and we want to make sure that everything is done in accordance with state guidelines and that uh you have a good chance to review that final draft.
But just giving you an update that's still on the on the agenda. It's still on our radar and probably January introduce that. Um any questions on construction report items there?
Okay. Moving on to engineering. Um we will have a number of resolutions that we're anticipating at the next meeting. First would be a resolution for that interlocal agreement with the county which we discussed for hillside trail drainage improvements. The uh attorney received a uh a template of that
agreement with the county uh reviewing that and we will have that for your review at the next meeting. But it's fairly boiler plate and again that is the county agreeing to cover all the costs of that. We're just taking on the share of uh going out to bid and being
the lead agency on that. Uh then after we enter into that venture local, we want to go out to bid so that way we don't waste any time. There will be a resolution for your consideration to authorize bidding for those drainage improvements. Uh and then uh also authorizing bidding
for the estate ADA improvements which we reviewed. And then finally um an resolution to authorize a change order for striping. Um that is to account for the exact costs. So uh when we do the initial
award to through the county co-op for the stripers and for the pavers it's based on estimates uh and we understand that field conditions may vary. Uh because we did a resolution ended up being slightly more. We're talking about not even $1,000 or so uh increase. We do
need a change order. And then u we are expecting the bids for the poolable rebid. Uh we rejected them a month ago because they were too high. We are hoping rebids come in at a much more reasonable cost and then we can
make an award. But if not, we would have to reject and authorize another rebid. So that that is anticipated one way or another for us to take some action at next meeting. Um any questions on any of those or Mr.
So the pool we're in September now the long the length of the time on that take a little while before we before the contract before the construction begins you're looking probably following year
most likely. Yeah, most likely if if for any reason our engineer feels that we can be aggressive and get it done, but if there's any risk to it affecting the operations, we don't want to do that. Um, but there's there's work involved in it because we get the bids, we want to review the bids, make sure that even
just because there's a good, let's say there's a good low bid, we want to make sure that it's also responsible bidder and that they've complied with all the requirements. Uh, and our attorney reviews the bids as well. And then we have a precon meeting. of supplies. So once we have more of
that information, we'll be able to make a recommendation on that. But um you know, we'll receive the bids regardless if they come in. We have to take some sort of action by law within a certain time frame to either award or reject. Yeah. So we certainly appreciated that
the finite window of time during which this potential project could go underway. Yes. Um so we made uh uh we followed through on on planning steps to be a position to do that. Unfortunately
uh the process by which the bidding and the vendors the results of that amounted to a single bid if you're recall numbers were astronomically higher than what we projected. So I think we're left with no other reason than to reject formally
reject the bid and restart the process go out. Correct. I I did have a couple uh items on the matter of the yesterday ADA improvements. Yes. Um just a close um or maybe a continuence of prior inquiry or conversation.
Um we were made aware of of it was asked whether or not uh grants that would support ADA projects um could be pursued and there may or may not be one and that that is being looked into. To the extent that we can capitalize on that, we certainly will make every effort to do so.
Uh un John and I uh had our meeting today and we both terms of the grant we don't we the current grant which uh one that we had referenced before it's called recreational opportunities for disabilities uh that would not this
would not apply or meet the requirements for that. Okay understood. Now with regard to all these the engineer information has been made available uh in the appropriate spot under engineering in the website. Yes. And the revised drawings will be
also published on that this week as well for for the 88. Okay. Got it. Okay. Understood. Thank you, Mr. Chi. Um I do want to note under uh John's report um one addition that could be discussed some more but it's I think
some positive news. Uh John and I are we are uh looking at uh a proposal. I've asked John to give us a proposal to to um conduct an analysis of our storm water infrastructure uh and to do so in
a way that gathers that data so it can be put into a GIS system. Uh because with the increase in significant weather events that we've been experiencing complaints of flooding localized neighborhood flooding and uh surges of
storm water infrastructure. uh we certainly want to be in a position to evaluate those and make recommendations for any necessary capital infrastructure improvements. But in order to do so, we want to know what that infrastructure
is, its age, its uh condition, its uh capacity. And right now we have that but only on an uh sort of as needed basis and it's wherever it is available it's old paper records. So, um, we're we're
looking at doing a townwide analysis of our storm water infrastructure, everything from storm drains to, um, manholes to pipes to, uh, outflows, all of that stuff, and carving it up into priority areas with different estimates so that way we can use that information
for future planning purposes. So it's something that doesn't yet exist but I think it would be very helpful to uh taking us into future and being able to prepare and and uh make improvements. So expect uh some discussion on that in the
coming meetings with John. Um under finance uh we are expecting a resolution uh for the budget amendment for a grant that we received an annual grant usually comes after our budget adoption.
communities grant. Um I also want to note that this month we are going to be starting the budget process for 2026 uh and that looks like a uh sheets spreadsheets that go to all the department heads to start gathering information from them and their requests
for next year. We could collect that along with uh other information that's not department specific but everything from health care costs to professional costs to um anything else that comes up pensions liabilities uh revenues a full analysis. So we're starting that process
this month uh so that way we can be ready for January with the uh new finance subcommittee to have a budget adopted in 2026 uh on time as we've been doing for the last couple years. Um I do want to note uh if you've looked
at the finance report too I I want to commend our finance team has as well because um if you looked at that our revenues are good uh they are for the most part on track and in some areas better than expected. You know look at uniform fire safety. you know, fire
official was just here. He's been doing a great job to ensure that uh all inspections that need to be done are done, that life hazard, non-life hazard uses are being inspected to make sure that everybody's safe and our inspect expenditures overall seem to be right on the money. What I do is I look at okay,
you know, the report was through the end of August. So that's eight months. 8 divided by 12 that gives us a percentage and then look at finance report. Are we in the ballpark? And we are there. So that's a testament to uh good budgeting that we've been doing uh the department
sticking to their budgets. So I just want to point that out as we uh come close to the end of the year. Uh under police um we will have a swearing in of the sergeant at the next meeting. Chief included his report. Were
there any questions there? Okay. Under public works a number of resolutions there. We did discuss the MCMUA. That's the Morris County Institute Utilities Authority recycling agreement. Uh that's a quasi shared service with them to provide for the
collection of recyclables. Uh the agreement is expiring and so we have to renew that agreement. We'll need a resolution uh to do that. That will be slated for the next meeting. Uh shared service with Harding for the sharing of public works equipment. Uh are there any
questions on that? I did provide an email, but you may not have all had a chance to do that. before the meeting. Okay. Any remaining questions or concerns there? Okay. Um I think it's it's a great opportunity for us to save money rather
than having to buy large pieces of equipment and uh you know burden taxpayers with more capital expenditures there. So uh credit to our public works director Rich on that. Um, we'll have a resolution to award a contract for the National Playground
Equipment that will be paid for largely uh a large chunk of that through state grant that we received. Uh, a resolution to purchase trailers. These were items that were uh included in the capital budget and now DPW has uh
gone through the quoting and procurement process. The information I believe is in the agenda packet quotes. We'll have a resolution for that at next meeting. questions. And then finally, under WPC, our water pollution control, uh there's some
vertical turbine and other equipment that uh Mr. Miller had included in monthly report and uh there were some attachments included in the agenda packet. We'll need a resolution to authorize those purchases. I do want to take an opportunity again
to recognize Rich Young, our superintendent, not only on everything he's been doing with the department, but also this year. Um he's he's just fantastic and he's always willing to help uh day or night, weekend, whenever it is. And
thanks to him, we had another successful pool year. Uh every year, regardless, there's some hiccup or something that happens. This year was no exception. And Rich uh stepped in. He was also a certified pool operator. And we were able to uh benefit from that
certification uh this year. And I want to really credit tax collector. Any questions on his reports? Yeah. Well, just I'm sorry, no, sorry, I'm good.
Yeah. Um uh the the Berkel turbine is is an expenditure which was was part of the uh it was a plan expended expenditure. Correct. Okay. account for in the 2025
county capital budget for water pollution control. Understood. Thank you. Thank you. Uh tax collector um report there. Any questions? And then finally, uh not to be labor tax
assessor because we had a whole almost hour and a half on assessment matters. Any uh questions or concerns or anything on the assessor report there Mr. That is it for uh workshop. Great. At this time we now move on to second
hearing of citizens. Mr. Kanti, do we have anyone raising their hands? There are no hands raised online. At this time, I invite uh anyone uh in the audience to come before the mic should they desire to do so. I see no one coming before the
microphone. So, I shall now close the second hearing of citizens. Do I have a motion to the meeting? Mayor, just you did want to go to executive or That's right. So, I just would note then for the public, uh if we do go into executive,
we are not planning to take any action afterwards. So, uh Once the executive session is concluded then the meeting will be concluded we have to thank this time now I see a motion to adjourn the meeting
are we journing or we going to executive there's two different things to executive session second so who who made the motion committ okay it's at 950 okay let me get
Uh, Mr. Al Perovitz, yes. Mrs. Zwald, yes. Mr. McHugh, yes. Deputy Mayor Roland, yes. And Mayor Joy, yes. Motion passes. And Stacy, I'll send you a new link for executive session. Thank you. Thank you.
Can I change my mind? No. Recording stopped. Sometimes I'm just on autopilot. Oh my god. Like it.