WEBVTT

METADATA
Video-Count: 1
Video-1: youtube.com/watch?v=7_crXQ4BmuE

NOTE
MEETING SECTIONS:

Part 1 (Video ID: 7_crXQ4BmuE):
- 00:00:33: Pledge, Invocation, and Meeting Open with Roll Call
- 00:02:40: Public Comment for Agenda Items and Proclamation of National Week
- 00:05:10: Consent Agenda and Authorizing Budget Read by Title
- 00:06:21: Public Hearing Opens: Ray Polidoro on Tax Increases
- 00:12:46: Sam Sweet Questions Budget Numbers & Previous Year Percentage
- 00:17:55: George Barrett Suggests Budget Cuts and Housing Reduction
- 00:19:48: Joseph Banano: Salary Increases Within Budget Measures
- 00:21:29: AJ Torres: Dispensary Money and Snow Removal
- 00:22:44: Kelsey Pen: Property Tax Increase Impact on Families
- 00:24:13: Janice: Seniors Being Pushed Out Due to Taxes
- 00:26:48: Ray Polidoro: Revenue Problem is Spending Problem
- 00:32:13: Sam Sweet: Smart Budgeting is Key, Not Cutting
- 00:36:34: Bonita: Get Involved and Pack the Room
- 00:38:31: Julia Higgins: Seniors Struggling on Fixed Incomes
- 00:41:20: Kenneth Norman: Wanting Services to Work Better
- 00:46:20: Mary Hendris: Seniors Struggling, Need Food Assistance
- 00:51:08: George Barrett: Hatch Act and Budget Cut Ideas
- 00:53:54: Sam Sweet: Pool Fees, Cable Fees, Municipal Court Fees
- 00:59:46: Janice: Aggravated with No New Taxes Promise
- 01:01:42: Virginia Roco: Taxes Too High, Considering Moving
- 01:04:58: George Barrett: High Healthcare Costs for Seniors
- 01:07:24: Sam Sweet: Overborrowing, Citizens Budget Dismissal
- 01:12:06: Public Hearing Closed and Responses to Comments Start
- 01:31:20: GTE GOV Email Read: Valerie Smith's Tax Questions
- 01:34:59: Miss Jen Tilly - Social Media Policy Question
- 01:39:35: Second Public Portion Opens: Ray Polidoro on Dialogue Lack
- 01:45:31: Sam Sweet: Questions Ignored, Hitting Cages Inquiries
- 01:50:38: Kenneth Norman: Spring Valley Park and Dispensary Budget
- 01:54:27: Second Public Portion Closes, Director Polling Begins


Part: 1

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Good evening. Please rise for the pledge of allegiance and please remain standing for the invocation by Pastor Rickine of Laura Hill Church. I pledge algiance to the flag of United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under

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God, indivisible, liberty and justice for all. Let's pray together. Lord, thank you for our mayor, this council, and leaders at every level of our township. Thank you for their hard work and sacrifice. We ask you to

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continually bless them. Give them wisdom so that they may solve problems, distinguish between right and wrong, and bring order, stability, and prosperity to our community. May every person, marriage, family, school, and business in our community enjoy the blessings of

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God. For we pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen. >> Thank you. Good evening. This regular meeting of the township council is being held in accordance with the schedule of the meetings of the township council established and adopted by the township council which schedule designated the

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time and date and place of this meeting. Adequate public notice of this meeting has been provided pursuant to the provisions of the open public meetings act. We are using an electronic amplifying and recording device in order to attain a clear and audible record. And we request all those wishing to speak be recognized and state your name

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and address directly into the microphone. The recording device to be solely utilized by the township clerk's office for the preparation of minutes and shall be the official record of the township council meetings. Madam clerk, may I roll call, please? >> Mr. Minion >> here. >> Mrs. Aubrey Troxel here. >> Mrs. Grace Love.

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>> Mr. Nash >> here. >> Mrs. Walters here. >> Mr. Castro >> here. >> Mr. Marcato >> present. >> Mr. Hutcherson >> present. >> Mr. Cartis >> here. >> Chief Manazi >> here. >> Mr. McIll >> here. >> Miss Weiss. Miss >> Mrs. Eric

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>> here. >> Miss Grace Love had a family commitment and she notified me beforehand. Uh now we have our public comment. Uh public participations for only agenda items only. Anyone addressing council may speak one time. There's 15 minutes allocated for this portion. Three

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minutes for each speaker. uh those who came here to speak about the budget, there is a public hearing for that that is separate from this and you can uh provide any comments during that time period if you choose to do so. So this is for agenda items only. Anyone wish to speak on this matter? Any agenda items?

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Seeing none, we'll close the first public portion proclamation national public works week. Whereas public works services provided in our communities are an integral part of our citizens everyday lives. And whereas the support of an informed

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and engaged citizenry is vital to the efficient operation of public works systems and programs such as water, sewers, streets and highways, public buildings, and snow removal. And whereas the health, safety, and comfort of this

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community greatly depend on the dedicated efforts and skills of public works professionals, engineers, managers, and employees. And whereas these essential services could not be provided without the commitment and tireless efforts of our

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public works professionals who design, build, operate, and maintain the infrastructure and the services that allow our communities to thrive. And whereas the American Public Works Association has determined the week of

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May 17th through the 23rd, 2026 as National Public Works Week with the theme rooted in service powered by community, which encourages all citizens to celebrate and recognize the vital role public works plays in connecting us

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all through infrastructure and service. Now therefore, be it resolved that Mayor David Mayor of the Township Loster and Orlando Marcato, President of Council, do hereby proclaim May 17th through May 23rd, 2026

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National Public Works Week. >> Thank you, Madam Clerk. Next is our consent agenda. Any council member like to have any item removed from the consent agenda, please speak up. Hearing none. I intend a motion to accept the consent agenda as presented.

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>> I'll make that motion. >> Second. >> On the question. Roll call, please. >> Mr. Minion? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Aubry Troxel? >> Yes. >> Mr. Nash? >> Yes. >> Mrs. Walters? >> Yes. >> Mr. Castro? >> Yes. >> Mr. Marcato? >> Yes.

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>> Bear with us for a second. You have batteries in the back. Is there someone who >> I can keep track if you >> I have a couple. >> Okay. >> Sure. Let's after >> Yeah. Let's wait till we get to

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resolution 172. >> Okay. Resolution 172, resolution of the township council, the township of Gloucester authorizing the township clerk to read the 2026 township budget by title only. >> May I have a motion? I'll make that motion.

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>> Second. >> There's on the question. >> So, we have a public hearing before. >> No, we have to do that first and then do hearing and then just >> Well, we're introducing on the question. Roll call, please. >> Mr. Minion, >> yes. >> Mrs. Aubry Troxel,

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>> yes. >> Mr. Nash, >> yes. >> Mrs. Walters, yes. >> Mr. Castro, >> yes. >> Mr. Marcato, >> yes. Uh, we will now open up a public hearing on the 2026 introduced budget. Uh before uh we entertain any comments, there is a resolution to amend the

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budget uh where there was a a reduction of close to half million dollars u in the budget that there is an amendment that has to be uh sent to the state for approval. But we will have the public

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hearing on the introduced budget. Would anyone like to speak on this matter? Mr. Mr. Paloro. Mr. Sweet, I saw your hand, so I have you go second. Uh before you speak, each speaker is

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entitled to five minutes. Um and then we'll go to the next speaker. If you choose to come back up again, you may do so after everyone else has spoken that chooses to speak. >> Good evening, council. Ray Pidor from the historic village of Ariel.

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So uh once again uh we meet on an even numbered year uh as we did in 14 2016 2018 2020 22 24 and again in 2026 to discuss a property tax increase. the uh

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uniformity of the fact that you do that in every odd number even number year uh has just gotten a bit much and in years I have commented sometimes sarcastically that uh you guys really are terrible at

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your job every other year and then other years you're good. I address that mainly to Mr. Cartis. Now, I know that we don't have a dialogue anymore. That worked too effectively in our back and forth, but unfortunately, we get to comment and then you comment after we're done and

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it's usually a word salad that never actually addresses what we've asked. And I hope that you get better at it with a few more people in the room. So, of these years that you've done this, um, like last year, and Mr. Cartis will

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correct me if I'm wrong. Uh you managed to use $11 million in surplus to balance the budget to hold the line on uh on taxes last year, which coincidentally was an election year. Now $1 million of surplus sounds like uh an enormous

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amount of money for simple $6 million worth of surplus. You shut the MUA down and changed our world or you will shortly. this year you managed to use $4 million for and this this is going to help you but not help us. Uh and yet you

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couldn't find a solution that would make it a little bit more palatable for the taxpayers. Um as usual everybody will get up here and speak and as usual you will do what it is you have set to do. That is your long game. That is always how you've been and that is how you

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always will be. Um, so with all of that going up and the fact that I believe the levy was mispronounced in the media, uh, when the notice went out, instead of $60 million, uh, to be raised by taxation,

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you put out 60 and that m $9 million was a typographical error. Well, when you're in accounting, a typographical error of $9 million is not a typo. It's a huge mistake. And I don't know if you corrected that in the paper, but you may have online and on uh the website. That

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being said, um what you're going to be doing is burdening the seniors of this town because people believe falsely that a property tax freeze is a freeze. As you continue to tax the people of Gloucester Township, the seniors are required to come up with that extra

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money. When you're on a fixed income, you don't get to find extra money. You don't get to run around and do stuff and side jobs. I can still do it because I'm only 64, but I'm getting there and I'm not going to be able to do this forever, but I'm also not going to be here

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forever, God willing. But, you know, one year two residents stepped up to the plate that both have accounting degrees or were accountants is their job and they suggested a citizen's budget. You guys took a quick

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peek at it, read the highlights, couple paragraphs like Evelyn Wood would teach you to do, speed reading, and you never really gave it a thought. Maybe uh you should have read those things a little better. Listen to some citizens because they have good ideas, too. You were once citizens.

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Um I'm sure that healthc care costs have gone up. I'm sure that some things have gone up that justifies your raising the taxes, but we still haven't gotten an answer from a catastrophic event in your self-funded

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medical that required you to borrow money, several million dollars, when there was a catastrophic event that needed to cover somebody. Uh, and I believe you're gu you're insured through uh Connor Strong uh and the machine um

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uh healthc care coverage, but it's still going up. And this will be the highest one since 2010 when the mayor first took office and had two back-to-back 20% tax increases. Um, and even though you try to blame that on the previous mayor, uh,

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what was a common denominator back then is both the former mayor and the current mayor both had the same accountant and business administrator. So, blame who you want. The guy that does the numbers is the one that presents that to the town. Um, right now it's just getting to

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be where uh you feel secure that everybody's going to constantly reelect you and you're going to keep doing the same thing, which means we told everyone this is going to happen in 2026. Um, I'm sure you'll take a year off next year and in 2028 you'll do it again. And it's getting to the point where the people of

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Glouester Township are almost saying thank you GT. May I have another? Thank you for your time. >> Thank you Mr. Father or Mr. Sweet. You go after Mr. Sweet, sir. >> Good evening, council. Sam Sweet from Aerial. >> Good evening, >> Orlando. You look like you lost some

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weight. >> Thank you. >> Just just noticing. Anyway, um >> Okay, >> but budget time. um numbers that are being thrown around are 14%, 14.7 12%. Regardless, since the

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mayor has taken office, taxes have increased by over 100% since he's taken office since 09. Other towns in the same area, Cherry Hill, Washington Township, have not increased by that much. In fact, some of them have decreased. Vorhees has

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decreased the last two years. Before you tell me I'm wrong, you forget what I do. I'm an accountant. I deal with the senior freeze. I have a variety of clients that are actually not entitled to the senior freeze because their taxes went down. Our taxes have never gone down even in COVID where you get decided

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to raise them 9.9%. All right. I would have been a little more prepared with questions regarding the budget, but I didn't get it get the uh budget revenue preparation worksheet until almost like 5:00.

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Um, but certain questions come to play where things don't make sense. The first thing is you have a line item, and you can answer this later because I know there's no back and forth. You have a a line item that says previous year percentage. I'm assuming that's the change in percentage of the budget.

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Well, sometimes it's zero. Sometimes it's there's a number in it. Zero means that it hasn't changed from the prior year or you would think, but there are places on the budget where those numbers don't make any sense. I can go through each and every one of them. I I'll be more than happy to go

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through and send it to each and every one of you, but I need you guys to take a look at this budget in detail because there are things that just don't make sense. For instance, you have, and I'm not picking on them, but I just don't understand.

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We have police special services officers. All right, I'm not picking on them. I'm not saying that they're not deserving, but the prior four years they were $240,000 average. Last year was a $345 average or $345,000

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actual and now we're asking for 350. Why aren't we asking for 345? Why aren't we doing a an average? All right, there's other things in here as well. We have my favorite snow removal. All right. This past year, snow removal, we all

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know what the storms had, what the ISIS had. Then there was overtime over $157,000. That was a actual number. The prior years was an average of about $75,000 in overtime. But yet this year now we're asking for 150,000. We're not

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taking into consideration that we might have a mild winner. We're we're all of a sudden upping it there. There's other all throughout here. Yes, each individual one doesn't equate to the budget,

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but when you add them all together, they raise that budget presumably that citizens budget that Mr. Polydoro referred to was I was behind that myself and another resident. We determined that we could cut the budget.

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I forget the actual numbers and I'll bring it to the next meeting. said I would sit down with you guys one by one or as a group and go over the budget of Dary numbers. Tell me I'm wrong. I sat up here, stood up here and said, "Tell me I'm wrong and I'll keep my mouth shut for the rest of

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my time in here at Glosser Township." But not one of you took me up on that offer because you guys knew I was right. Bottom line, I'm probably going to be right again. 14.7% or 12% if you're going to cut it

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because it's $500,000. It It's ridiculous, especially now 100% when Washington Township is lowering. So, you guys need to look at this budget. If you guys do not have this worksheet, I can email it to you. This is the budget revenue worksheet. This is

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the one that the that you guys do not get unless you ask for it. And I had to beg, borrow, and steal to get it by 5:00 so I could have at least some questions asked. All right, I'm probably going to come up here because my time's almost up. I'll let other people speak. I'm going to go through here and ask other questions.

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You can answer those questions at the end, but I'll be more detailed at another hearing. You guys, you guys are citizens just like us. And yes, you guys get paid. So maybe you're not getting hit as hard, but every one of us is going to get hit hard, not only because of this, but because of the schoolboard budget,

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which is going up 7.7%. And they've held the line pretty much the last four or five years. So that's 14 and seven. That's over 20% increase in taxes. Unless my math is wrong. I don't think my math is wrong.

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I'm out of time. I'll come back. >> Thank you. >> Yes, sir. >> George Barrett, uh, from the Sickleville section, 11 Brookshshire Road. I'm going to speak different than these people. As a senior citizen, as I see, most of us

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are senior citizens here. I don't get a pay raise anymore. I live on my retirement. So, whatever inflation the United States comes up with this year, Social Security is going to give me a 1%, 2%, maybe 3%. Pay raise, but it's a year behind. You guys are not looking at

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the budget to cut it. I mean, cut it. Let's have trash collect every two weeks. I can live with that. That could save a lot of money in the budget. Have you guys looked at reduction in force? We don't have to have 20 parks through this community. Downgrade it to 10. We

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can save money on whatever that thing was the beginning about uh civil service. I did 36 years in the post office as a manager. I went through two years of getting told by my district manager, state president,

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I'm not getting the pay raise. Eat it. Well, we have a reduction in force. That's what you guys have to look at. Cutting jobs. If the people think that's not right, don't give them a 5% pay raise. Give them a zero pay raise. If they don't like it, they can go to other

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towns and look for a job. That's where you guys ain't doing anything. You're not cutting, you're not cutting waste. I'm going to speak. I don't need five minutes, but we need to reduce, not add. And the other big thing we keep adding t

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we keep adding more uh uh communities. will say that housing housing adds cost. Why don't we just stop? We're not we're not we don't keep growing this town because every time you put a new development in with 100 houses, the

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trash cost goes up. This uh strode cost goes up. Police we have to hire another policeman. Man, come on. Let's stop growing as a community and start cutting things. Have a good day. >> Thank you, Mr. Barrett.

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Mr. Bernano. >> Hi, Joseph Banano. Uh, Cornet Lane, Somerdale, New Jersey or Good evening, >> Timber Birch area. >> So, uh, I'm going to sort of run off of his lead here. I think one of the things when we look at salary increases, we

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understand, you know, everybody needs a salary increase, right? But I think it needs to be within measure of what we're facing, right? So if the objective is to try to balance our budget, then we do need to take a look at where we can cut

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costs or to say, look, this year we're not getting a salary increase. I mean, a lot of us here are have positions or jobs where we're not getting or we're getting 1.3% or or some minimal number just to keep things going. So I don't want to waste a lot of time, but I do

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think it's a very important issue. And I do think uh I think one of the other gentlemen talked about a uh I think it was Steve I talked about an awareness from a citizens group that deals with budget also doesn't necessarily mean you have to follow it but you need to listen

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to what the residents are saying right we have to cut costs on things that we're doing to live and I believe we really need to seriously think about that and try to find a solution to it right so I would hope that you can respond back in the future try to sit

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down and gather as a group and try to hear it out. I mean, we don't have a lot of people here tonight, but I do think it's important. >> Thank you, Mr. Padano. Yes. Yes, sir. >> Hello, AJ Torres and I'm right in Blackwood. I don't need a I mean it

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really one is what are we doing with the money from the dispensaries? We have five in the town. They're supposed to get kickbacks for taxes, reductions, and all that. I don't see it nowhere. And honestly, the town doesn't do a

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great job even cleaning us out in the snow and doing all the jobs they should be doing to getting a whole pay raise when we're not even being taken care of. Both storms we I neighbors had to actually plow our streets to be able to

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get off the houses. We call the town, we will take care of it. The plow trucks will come through, plows up, we will ask them to do it. That was not their job. So why should they get an increase? Why should every state employee should get

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an increase but us that work in the private sector can't? But you guys do. And that's what I'm going to leave it at. >> Thank you. any Yes, in the back. >> Hello, my name is Kelsey Pen. I live in Blackwood over at the Village and Shoes.

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And >> hello. >> Hello. I am here as a newer member of this township. I've been a hone over here for about four years, a little over. And I looking at this crowd, I'm maybe one of the younger members here. I have a young family. I'd like to

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consider myself an active member of this community. I get out there. I support local. I go to the local restaurants. I am involving my toddler in all the activities that I can. So, I can only speak from my perspective to say that with this property tax increase being

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proposed, those activities that I love taking my toddler to, I will not be able to do. I work a full-time job. My husband works a full-time job. He's a federal employee. These are still things that we will struggle to do living here as a member of this township. So, the

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seniors, an incredibly important group of individuals that you need to be considering, but also those of us raising young families. We can't afford to grow our families, to grow this community with these costs, with these raises in these property taxes that I don't feel like I'm seeing the benefit

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of. So, that's what I have to say. Thank you. >> Thank you. Is there anyone else would like to speak who has not spoken yet? All the way in the back, please. >> Hi. Uh my name is Janice. I actually live in Glenn Oaks. Um I just retired so

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in um actually January 31st. Um hopefully, you know, I own my home. Um, but you know, now I'm on social security. My husband's retired. Um, this would definitely be a major burden on us

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to stay. I feel like, um, we as senior citizens, because that's what I am now, we're being pushed out. And it's not just even this township, it's the state. The state is really not doing a good job at all. Um, as far as our our seniors, I

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mean, you know, the governor wants to cut everything. cut, you know, our I mean, I just started I got the one check to get some money back from the property, which would help me, you know, but now she might change that and lower it, which I think is absolutely a

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disgrace, but ju just, you know, I I mean, I have a son lives at home who's been trying to save to buy a home, but the property taxes, he can't afford to leave my house. Like I want them to go, but I mean obviously the housing market,

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it's ridiculous how much these houses are going for. But adding on top the property taxes on a mortgage for a single person, he can't leave because he can't can't you can't afford it, you know. So to to

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him as far as again being a younger person trying to get out, wants to stay in the township, but it's unaffordable. And for me as a senior and what we're seeing with the with these t property taxes, I mean, we're we're like this

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state is the highest in the country. I don't get it. I think a lot needs to be done in Trenton. A lot of needs to be looked at, but as far as like this township, we feel like we're being pushed out. You know, we're we're seniors. We're not going to be able to afford it. I don't want to go into a 55

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and over. I got grandchildren. I don't want anybody telling me you can't change your curtains. You know, that's not me. I just want to have be comfortable. I love this township. Been here 32 years from Philly and um but we we my husband

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and I want to stay here and be able to afford to stay here. So, thank you. >> Thank you, Miss Janice. Anyone else would like to speak not spoken yet? Mr. Por, thank you again, council. Just a

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reminder from historic village of Ariel. Um, in the years that I've been coming to these meetings and, uh, I did take a break from you guys for six months, felt very good. Um, I remember um

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the township uh business administrator uh stating in a time of u crucial decisionm about raising our taxes and it almost felt like I I took one of those uh super sour gumdrops and uh put

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one in between my cheek and gum when he said we have a revenue problem, not a spending problem. And a revenue problem could be a justifiable answer if it didn't keep on happening every other year. You have a revenue

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problem. But if you continue to spend at record levels, you're always going to have a problem, but it's not a revenue problem. It's a spending problem. Spending is what causes taxes to go up.

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high expenses of regular bills and and responsibilities that are mandated. We get that. We don't agree that they be given generous raises, but you start looking at um what can we cut? And I remember being here when Councilman

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Hutchinson would make his reference to, well, if we save one cockroach from getting killed in the house, we have we're effectively saving money. uh and and it'll always be the worst case scenario that would come up. Um but we look at what can we what can we cut in

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spending to save us money and I I look around the township been coming to the meetings long enough. I look at uh some of the new jobs that you create. You created a job for a barbecue planner for certain groups. I gave that person a

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generous 90ome,000 salary. I mean that helps $90,000. It may not mean a lot to you, but to us it does. You know, you guys don't make a great salary for doing what you're doing. What are you making? 9,000, maybe 10,000. For some of us that pay a property tax,

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that's what our property taxes are. And to some people, it would pay only half their property tax for one year. But that's a nice little chunk of money to come out, you know, and I know you do more than just come to two meetings a year out doing the things you got to do. But let's think about what you can cut.

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Another thing you can cut and I think um Mr. Marcado and Mr. Cartis, you'll remember this one when I came to a council meeting. Uh I arrived early and you guys were actually doing the workshop which you've challenged me to come to many times but I happen to be

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here for that one and a young fellow from Remington and Vernick sat down to discuss a new boiler for public works and what he described was we can't use the same boiler because times have changed. We need a more economical, more efficient boiler. And it's going on in a

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public works building. It's no big deal. It's going to go in the same room. It's going to go in the same spot. Now, being in the heating and air conditioning and service business, I understand you hire professionals to do that. That's their job to know what size to use, what

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plenum to use, what boots to make the adaptations to, and what BTU ratings or what venting's got to be done. the people that do that work. That's their job. But no, we pay Remington $37,000 to close one eye and hold their thumb

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out and say, "Yeah, put it right there where the old one was." $37,000. I'll never forget that council meeting. No offense, Mr. McIll, but that's a little steep. That's what we call consultants. You guys got a ton of them.

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A ton of consultants. Yeah. Put it there. Let's run a stopwatch on the yellow lights. Make sure that our red light cameras are good. $3,500 to stand there with a stopwatch. Nice. Think about some of the ridiculous things that we put money out. The jobs

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we create. The barbecue planner. $90,000 is a lot of money. There's places you can cut. But what these some of these people are new to this meeting for the first time, but I can assure them that all you're doing is you're going to sit

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here and you're going to run out the clock. You're going to let everybody speak and I wish you would show a little emotion and every other even number year you've been doing this. That lady cried on a 94 degree day. Couldn't afford her electricity. You guys didn't flinch.

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show a little emotion, but the bottom line, you're not going to change a thing. You're going to pass this however it goes. You're gonna ram it up the tales of the people of this township, and you'll sit on it until 2028. You'll skip the election year and do it again. I don't know that I could get you to

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show compassion. Compassion would be changing your mind and not doing this. Thank you for your time. I wish you luck and and God be with you as making this dreadful decision. >> Thank you. Anyone else? Mr. Sweet Sam from Ariel again. Council

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budgeting. It's not about cutting. Let's be clear. I'm I never once said I wanted to cut anything. I want smart budgeting. All right. If you over overstate your expenses and understate your income, you're creating a mythical

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gap. All right, we all know the township raises has taxes. That's how they get them. Tickets, fines, permits, whatever else, construction fees, whatever else they can get. They have a

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they have a set number, but before that number is set, they determine what the expenses are going to be. So if you overstate those expenses and understate your revenue, you're creating that mythical gap where we have to raise taxes in order to make that make that

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happen. It's accounting 101 or budgeting 101. And Mr. Cartis seems not to do it. All right. I could ask Mr. Cartis, I'd love to know what the pool revenue is right now as compared because I can't find it on here right now, but

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I'd love to know what the actual pool revenue is. It is May 11th most dues are already in for the pool for the public pool. Prior years he has budgeted $75,000 $90,000. Those fees are 105 110 as the summers

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get hotter. 120. He never budgeted. It's never gone over $100,000. That's a $20,000 gap right there. All right. Here's another example. All right. With playgrounds. And I'm not saying we cut these. I'm saying we do smart budgeting. playgrounds, field topper.

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Okay. In 2022, we spent $3,800. In 2023, $6,300. 2024, $5,200. 2025, $5,900. I'm not saying we cut that, but why are we budgeting $7,500 for that? We've not gone over that in four years. Not even

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close to going over that. And yet, Mr. Can I interrupt you for a second? When you're referencing that, can you give me the page so we can all take page 90? Thank you. All right. And if you look, it says prior year percentage is zero. Well, because last year you budgeted $7,500 as

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well when the prior years were ridiculously low. So now you created a $1,600 expense. This this budget's $144 pages. This is expenses. If you create $1,600 on every

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expense, that's mi hundreds of thousands of dollars, maybe even close to over a million. I haven't gone through line by line. You can bet your butt I'm going to. The question is, are you guys going through it? I can guarantee you you're not. All right. Many of you have gone on record as saying, "Well, everything goes

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up." No, everything doesn't go up because whatever goes up can come down, they say as well. And we have to do smart. Another one. How about parks and playgrounds? 58 9800 5700 11,000 12,000.

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Anybody want to guess what we're requesting to be budgeted? $15,000. The highest one was 12. That's $3,000 more. I can go on and on. Here we go. Playgrounds, fertilizers, and seeds,

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48,000, 46,000, 60,000. Last year was 71,000. Now they're budgeting 70,000. That one maybe we can do. But once you put the fertilizer and the seeds down on all the playgrounds, then it's just maintaining the grass. So really, do we

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need 70,000 when the prior years were 46? Okay. How about parks and playgrounds landscaping? $177, 0 and23, 86 and 24, $4,360 in 25. What's being requested? What's

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being budgeted? Do we want to guess? What's being requested is $20,000. What's being budgeted is five. I did not say $5,000 at all at any point. This is budgeting 101.

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Overstating your expenses creates a mythical that we need more money. All right, I'll be back because I'm going to let somebody else speak because I got to go over the debt. That'll be fun. Does anyone else like to speak not

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spoken yet? Miss Bonita. >> Miss, you'll be after Miss Bonita in the blue. >> Good evening. I actually came here tonight to rant about my HOA as usual, but with all this tax talk, I would like

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to actually speak to the audience. There's a lot of people here tonight and that's really good. Okay. All right. I come to meetings all the time. There's two people. There's three people. You got to show up. You got to show up every

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time. Not only do you got to show up, you got to do like I do. How you think I got this big mouth, okay? Standing on the street corner ranting about my HOA stealing all the money. Okay? Get a bullhorn. Talk to your neighbors. Go have a cup of coffee with them. Sit

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down. Tell them your concerns. I'm upset. I'm 68 years old, okay? I don't want my taxes to go up, but luckily anchor program, all this stuff. Okay, but now I'm getting sidetracked. Sorry. I'm just saying start talking to people.

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Start getting each other. Okay, I was here the night they approved the pickle ball courts packed. Packed. You couldn't move in here. Half the people here weren't even from Gloucester Township. Okay, but guess

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what? They got their pickle ball court. Okay. So, if you can get this room and you can pack these people in time after time after time again, somebody's going to start listening. Okay. That's all I got to say. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

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>> Miss Bonita, in the future, please address council, not the public. >> Oh, I'm sorry. Thank you. >> Did I just, you know, and wasn't it a whole lot better than ranting about my HOA? Yes, ma'am.

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In the back. Yes. >> Scary walk up here. Good evening. >> That's okay. >> Um Julia Higgins, Ariel, um I know that the budget is going to be a done deal. I just came up to say what some of the other folks have been

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saying. I'm retired. I waited until I could be debtree to retire. I own my home. I own my 15-year-old car. And um

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I'm just by myself. So raising the taxes are very difficult on the seniors. I'm going to speak on behalf of seniors, especially when we own our homes. Um because if we have

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savings, we don't want to be taking from the savings to pay for the taxes, which is what I'm doing right now every three months. Um and the programs that um the

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state provides, there's talk that they're going to be reducing those or cutting them because it is true that the state is a mess, too. Um, I I don't mean to be disrespectful, but

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I don't know how the township people have voted for the mayor for 15 years. His little glossy flyers say, "Make Gloucester Township affordable."

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is that for buying things or shopping because I really feel it's not affordable to live here anymore. And um again, no disrespect, I don't know how you all keep getting

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elected. We need new fresh people up here, not the same people who say yes all the time. I too have been to some of the meetings.

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None of you speak it. You just follow whatever >> orders. Who said that? Um I'm sorry. I just wanted to make my voice heard too. Good night.

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>> Thank you, Miss Higgins. Does anyone else like to speak that's not spoken? Yes, sir. How you doing folks? Uh Kenneth Norman from Cicklerville, New Jersey. >> Good evening. >> Good evening. Um this is my first one of these, so I'm not really sure what the

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procedure is, what the decorum is, but I hear a lot of these people. I myself I'm on the younger side raising a young family like the young lady in the back there. Um but my mom is probably very similar to a lot of these people. Uh I

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hear a lot of the concerns uh about the budget, that sort of thing. I again this is my first one of these. So rather than come and beat you guys up, I don't know you. I really just like want to start to get involved. I want to start to learn more. I want to get my

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hands on this budget. Um, but that being said, I mean, some of the struggles that I feel, you know, uh, I've lived in my house in Cichlerville now for seven, eight years. Uh, I grew up in Blackwood. Um, and I

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think the biggest thing is when when things just like don't work. You know, if you're going to raise the price of things, I think we just kind of expect them to work. I think, you know, the snow removal like um the gentleman in the back brought up, you know, when you're snowed in for part of the day and

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it affects like your ability to get to work when you're relying on it. Um and they might not really understand why you're snowed in, how you can't get there. I think, you know, I some might not agree with this, but like you know, I take my kids to the park every day. They love it. Um you know, the park's

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really beat up, graffiti, things are broken. you know, they sit on a bench, they get stuck because it's snapped in half. It takes days for them to come out. You know, I was on the phone with animal control. Uh, and there were squirrels in my attic, but trying to get

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out of the attic, and I was told that, you know, I couldn't utilize their services until my family was in danger. Like, they said, "You couldn't, we can't do anything. You have to call an exterminator." you know, so some of these things, I mean, if we're raising the prices on them, I think we

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just kind of have an expectation that they're going to work, right? Um, that's really, you know, my piece on it. Um, budget, I haven't taken a look at it. Like I said, it's my first time here. Uh, the trend of things, how they're kind of going up. I think economically

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we can all agree that these are kind of unique circumstances uh in that a lot is happening at once. So things are kind of coming to an apex and we kind of have to solve those problems where we can. But um I mean I

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guess you know I I don't want to forget about our seniors like my mom is one of them. I still have to go over to her house and do a lot of things for her when you know some of the public works or whatever falls short um or she can't afford to do certain things and and I feel that. But also

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I want a good community for my kids. I want good parks. I want activities. I want the things that I had when I was a kid. I want the summer camp at the rec center where I made a lot of my friends. I want activities, basketball. I want to go to the pool. I want to go to all those

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things. I just want them to work. Um, you know, I know they're they might get a little bit more expensive, but if you guys do them and you do them well, you probably won't hear that complaint from me or my family, but you know, again, when we go to a park and things are shut down or broken for weeks on end, or you

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know, uh, a sidewalk, you know, my son's walking and and absolutely gets, you know, he he trips because things are cratering out of the ground or, you know, our we break our car on a on a road that's been awful for so long. I I think we just want those people who say

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they're coming out and they're working for us to do so. So, that's pretty much it. Um it's a pleasure to meet all of you guys. I plan on on being here and showing up like um the other lady said, you know, because it's uh it's important to me. Like I grew up here. I plan on

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raising my kids here and um you know, that's that's pretty much it. I hope you guys uh feel me when I'm saying that, you know, I'm I'm I'm here really trying to contribute and make this better. So, yeah, that's pretty much it. And hopefully, like uh Mr. Polyoro Pomodoro

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said, you know, we can get you to show some emotion because uh I'm up here showing some. So, thank you guys. >> Thank you, Mr. Norman. Appreciate >> Appreciate. >> Is there anyone else that like to speak not spoken? Yes, ma'am. Mary Hendris from the Hilltop section of Blackwood.

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>> Good evening. >> Good evening. I support all these seniors. I am also a senior. This might not affect you. You are all sitting up there. You all have cushy jobs. We have attorneys. We have people that work for the township, which I'm sure you get

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good salaries. But we don't get that. We have to struggle. I don't know if you go if you even go up and down the pike. There's sometimes that, you know, a lot of us, I'm sure, in the township go to

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Michelle, the unforgotten haven because we can't afford food to go to the grocery store because it's so high. Yes, I'm one of them people. I do go to the pantry to to try to struggle to pay my bills. So, I go there to get food.

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I'm not proud of it, but it's the way I can stay in Gloucester Township. Gloucester Township is not the way I grew up. We had skating rinks. We had other

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things. We didn't have half a dozen parks. We don't need all these parks. You know, when we grew up, it was like get out on the street. when the street lights turn off, you come home. We didn't have that. We didn't have parks. We go and made our own fun.

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And then you make jobs up for people like uh what is it? You have this trash people that are supposed to go along in the township and if they see trash on the street, trash patrol I think you call it, they're supposed to clean the

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street. That's a joke. I, you know, I've never seen it. This past snowstorm, me and my neighbors have to go out and undo the storm drains so the water can

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go through. When it's heavy rain, I go out and I got to the storm drains because public works is too lazy to go out and lift up the grates and clean them out.

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This is ridiculous. Why can't you people just sit there look at what we're trying to tell you? Take Don't even take your salaries. Maybe if if you didn't I know you get paid for this. Maybe if you don't take

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it for a year or two, try living on what we live on. Stop living that luscious little life that you living that you can think that you know you're

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untouchable. One day you're going to be down on your luck like you know not having enough money for food or anything or how you're going to keep your electric going. So just please do not do this to the citizens of Gloucester Township. I mean,

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there's nothing really. Downtown Blackwood is nothing. There's nothing there. There's no theater. There's no place to eat. It's not even like Pitman. If we

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had something like that. Yeah. But this township has zero. Nothing. And I would urge you please really take a good hard look at it and

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you all have minds. So don't one say yes and then you all say yes yes yes. Make up your own mind. Don't go along with anybody else because you don't want no feedback. You don't want them to say

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oh why did you do this? Use your own brains and decide on your own. Don't all just agree because one or two said yes and then you all follow suit like you always do

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because you can't neither one. Nobody up there can say no. And you all need to say no and maybe consider not taking any money from the township. the residents.

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Thank you. >> Thank you. Does anyone else like to speak has not spoken yet? >> Mr. Sweet. Come on down. >> I want to go back up. >> Oh, I'll get to you, sir. >> You brought me

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to go. >> Oh, sir, if you'd like to jump ahead of Mr. Sweet, by >> all means, go ahead. >> Yeah. >> How many of you are aware of the Hatch Act and what it is? What law was it? It's a federal law. Otherwise, I'd probably sitting where you are. But

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because I was a federal employee working for the post office for 36 years and my time in the Marine Corps, I was not permitted to be a politician. My father was and my grandfather was.

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But duty called for Vietnam. I went I didn't get pulled up. I didn't get drafted. I volunteered. Now, town newspaper, how much does it cost to print and deliver? That's something we could cut.

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If the people want to read this, we put it online. This is a budget cut right here. Cuz I know the post office ain't delivering it to you for nothing to the town members. Somebody is designing it,

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then we're paying a printer, then we're paying the post office. This is a budget cut. An easy and simple one. Most people probably just throw it away. Don't even read it. >> Take a poll, find out how many people

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even read it. And like I said, I was ineligible to run as a politician because of the Hatch Act, you know, but I just think you guys really don't take a look at things. Like I said, close some of the parks.

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Chief, how many new police cars do we get every year? Let's refurbish them. >> Take them to the Take them to a mechanic and get them rebuilt. Take them to the vocational school. They have an old auto mechanic shop there.

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They will rebuild them. That will save money instead of buying new ones. Same. We going to buy a new trash truck this year, a new snowplow this year. Let's think about cuts, not spending

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money. You know, I when I was in the post office manager, I had to stop I'd had to have my carriers bring the rubber bands back to save money. You know, same thing. Save the hampers,

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everything. We had to reuse, reuse, reuse because I was stuck with a budget. That's what I asked you to do. Try to cut some things, not spend more. Have a good day. >> Thank you, Mr. Barrett. Mr. Sweet.

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>> Uh, Samu again from Ariel. Uh page 138 we have there's the pool fees municipal pool fees. All right. Last three years 100,685 123,265

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122,355. What's being budgeted? $90,000. What's actually been collected so far? I think we can get an answer to that. Why? One. So my first question is why aren't we budgeting at least 100,000 or 105,000? All right. And how much has

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been collected that we know of right now? It's May 12th because I'm I'm not a member of the pool. Anybody here a member of the pool? When did the dues have to be in? So that's my question. I'm sure that we can get that answer. All right. We have cable TV fees. All right. 223,21

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234,000 238,023 230 in 24 221 in really almost 222 in 25 what's being budgeted $200,000.

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Those two items are $50,000. That's under budgeting on the income. You're understating the potential income which then creates that mythical tax. I'm not saying I want to be clear. I'm not saying we cut things. I'm saying we'd be smart about the budget. If you want to

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cut other things like the gentleman said the the newspapers or the the the letter I do read that, by the way. Okay. If you want to cut that, that's fine. But I'm not saying we need to cut anything. We just need to do smart budgeting, which you guys haven't done in the

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12 years I've been coming here and saying this. I we could I feel like an old record. I feel like my I'm turning into my father. I'm shouting at the clouds. All right, you guys. Right here. The numbers are right here. I could go on and on. Municipal court fees.

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All right. 333,000 342 362 353 366. Budgeting $330,000. Why Why aren't we budgeting 340 345 350? We We haven't been below 330 in six years.

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That's $30,000. Those three items alone are $80,000. How many more items do I have to go through to hammer that point home? The question is, have you guys done that? I'm not saying you guys need to take a pay cut, but earn your money. I should not have to do this, and I've done this

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in in an hour and a half that I had. And then in between, have you guys asked any questions? Because the last time I was here at a meeting, I asked about questions. I was told, "Oh, we doing it in emails." I opened the emails. I opened the text messages. You know what

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I got? I got my emails back that were me asking the questions. Not one of you asked a question on anything. Ask questions, guys. Come on. Seriously. I mean, interest on costs on taxes.

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We're budgeting $445,000. Last year, we collected 713,000. 357 before that. It's gone up every year. Why Why don't we do a smart budgeting? I'll be more than happy to sit with Mr. Cartis. I'll even bite my

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tongue if he can explain it to me. And if he tells me I'm wrong, you'll never hear from me again. But you guys don't do that. You don't want to sit down with the citizens of this town, the people that have questions, legitimate questions, and you just sit there and stare at me all and look like I have three heads. These are legitimate

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questions. And I can go on and on about this, just don't understand it. And I'd like an answer to that when I know we can't do back and forth anymore. All right, that's a whole different subject. But I'd like an answer. Why we can't sit down with the budget? Why did you

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dismiss the citizens budget when the numbers are right here? I wasn't making up numbers. I'm not making up numbers now. this came from your office and I I can go through it and create a whole new budget and create the citizens budget over again and tell me I'm wrong. Last

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time I was up here with the citizens budget, Mr. Carter said, "Well, you can't really do take an average of the last five years. That's averaging. We don't do that." But yet he does that with half the expenses. But yet when it when it proves proves

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him wrong, oh no, we can't do that. You as council members are our representatives. You are our elected representative. It doesn't matter whether I voted for you or not. Doesn't matter if these people voted for you. You're our representatives. You're all we've got.

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So a 14.7 increase 122% since ' 09. It's absolutely ridiculous. And it's because you're budgeting. You're you're doing your budget wrong. And then the extra money goes to other projects. All right, we could go I could go on and on about

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the other projects. How about Swamp Park or whatever it's called, Heritage Park on Somerdale Road. That was $40,000 used from someplace else because we mis misbudgeted. Happens every time. And we're not told about it because we're not supposed to

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be we don't have to be told about it. Well, just because we don't have to be told about doesn't mean we don't want to know. And the budget is wrong. I'd be more than happy. Again, I'm throwing it out there. sit down. Go over it. >> Thank you, Mr. Sweet. >> I'll be back. >> Is there anyone else would like to speak

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that's not spoken yet? >> Mr. Sweet, come on back. >> Oh, no. >> Miss Janice is >> just thinking of something else. But from what I remember,

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didn't the mayor run on not raising taxes, you know, to and this is what people vote for because as soon as somebody says we're not, you know, we're not going to raise taxes, everybody's like, I'm voting for that person. But here we

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are. I mean, that was six like six months ago. And so it's it was a lie because this is huge. And the last budget and I was here was approved before anybody even spoke. I mean, you know, that that went up. But again, I've

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been here 32 years and what I started off with with my with taxes and what it is now, the it's a shame because middle the middle class families are not going to make it here. They're not going to make it. And it's very sad. Um because I love this township. My kids all went

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through school here. Um I have a lot of relatives at state. That's my niece who who actually moved here. She loved my neighborhood. But these these people that middle class are now moving down to lower middle class, you know. So, I mean, if you have people that are affordable housing, they get help. But

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senior citizens, lower middle class are not going to have anything. And we're being pushed out. And it's a shame because this township could be built on a lot of these middle class families raising their children, but it's unaffordable. So, you know, I'm

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a little aggravated with when you know we're getting told like no new taxes and I'm like, "Okay, good." You know, every year we're I'm like just waiting for that tax bill to come in and say, "Oh, what is it now that I got to pay every three months?" And now to say this big jump is totally awful that we just

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cannot afford it. And we definitely need people to stand out for us and say no, they can't do this to us. Thank you. >> Thank you. Anyone else would like to speak has not spoken yet? Yes, in the

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back. >> Hi, my name is Virginia Roco. I live in the aerial section of township. >> Um, we moved here 32 years ago. When we first moved here, the taxes were about $3,000.

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Now they are over 10. Um, and we are now in the bracket of senior citizens. So, we're really looking at what we are spending and how we can cut back and so on and so forth. Um, I can't say that I see services

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that have um gotten better since we've been here. We moved here like for the school systems and so on. we had little kids, now we don't. Um, but it's just I just wanted to try and make a point that as we are getting older and are trying

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to watch the budget um and we see the countries uh expenses getting bigger, all like electricity, food, gas, everything has gone up and up and up. And it's really scary when you open up a tax bill each

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every three months, you know, um and you have to pay it and you have to scrge around to get the money to pay it. Um right now we're doing okay, but um if this keeps increasing and especially at the rate that you guys are talking for this increase alone, um it's not it's un

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unaffordable. It's scary. It's like a punch in the stomach when you open the bill and see that. And so I would just like you to consider the people that live here. We're just normal middle class American family. Um we do our

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best. We're really good neighbors. Um but this is really hard to swallow. Um, and again, I keep trying to urge my husband to to look at other um, towns to live in because I see that uh, if it keeps going the way it is, we aren't

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going to be able to afford it. And it's just it's a shame. You're going to lose some really good people. We're really good people. Um, so just think about that. Like I know we came a few times when you guys were going to sell the sewer authority and um, it was quite frustrating. I know we weren't allowed

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to have give and take. Um, uh, I felt like we had our voices heard and we got somewhere that with those meetings, but now I'm hearing rumors that it's going to happen anyway, which is sad because you ask people to come up here and talk and make their point and disregard it

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anyway or try and find another way to like wiggle through it. So, um, thing things like this are important to us. Uh, I think they should be important to you guys. again, take a look at your neighbors. Take a look at the people that have to move and leave because they

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can't afford it anymore. Um, like ourselves. So, that's it. That's all I wanted to say. Thank you. >> Thank you, Miss Roco. >> Anyone else like to speak that has not spoken yet? Hold on, sir. Let's see who >> go ahead, sir.

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>> Again, George Barrett from the Cichleville section. Uh, I might be a little bit different than some other people here. Yeah, I I get a federal pension plus social security, but I pay $14,000 a year in health costs. I don't know if

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any of you pay 14,000. My me and my beautiful wife, we have to pay Medicare. And then I was lucky enough as a federal employee to take my health insurance over to my retirement, $14,000.

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Now, I'm glad I did it because in January this year, I had triple bypass. Do you know what the bill was that for that? $240,000. $240,000. Now, because I had advanced, whatever it

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is, the two put together, I paid zero. But if I just had Medicare and paid $420 a month for me and my beautiful wife, I'd be found. Who's a lawyer up here? I'd be seeing one of you if you were a lawyer because I'd be paying cuz what's

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40? What's 20% of $240,000? That would been my hospital bill. I'd be filing for bankruptcy and still trying to live in this town. We're starting to go to the food bank, too. It's tough.

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I'm glad I paid that kind of money, but next year I'm just praying to the Lord, but maybe he'll give me guidance that I won't uh carry my keep carrying my federal insurance over. I'll freeze it, pause

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it, they call that. Got some other time I can go back and get it because I can't afford $14,000. It's a lot of money. I just want you guys to understand, you know, we're suffering out here in the town. Yeah. You all have a good night. I mean,

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it's really tough. I don't think any of you are paying $14,000 yet for insurance. A lot of people might be here. >> Thank you. Is there anyone else would like the suite that's not spoken yet, Mr. Sweet?

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I wasn't here for the passing of the capital budget. Uh we believe it was $9 million or might have been $10 million that we borrowed. Last year we borrowed $8 million. Um I've been looking for the where the but where the uh

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debt service is. I'm sure the debt service has gone up which is an expense which then I've increases taxes as well. Um back on the citizens budget in 21 it was proven that you guys authorized the

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borrowing of over a third because you bonded $36 million 12 million of which was overborrowed and I have all the receipts and stuff to prove it. So, $12 million is being paid back.

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Interest rate 3%. It's $360,000 a year in interest. That could have been avoided. Plus, we're we're paying 1.2 million because 10% never been told differently is the the rate that's going to the lawyer to bond that. All this

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comes into the bottom line. You guys just keep borrowing and borrowing and borrowing on top of the bad budgeting which then creates this we have to we have a revenue problem because we don't have enough to meet our expenses.

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We actually do if you actually budget properly. People are here saying the cut. I'm not once used the word I want to cut expenses. I want to budget properly. Delve into it. You guys are looking at me like I have three heads. Not one bit of emotion. Mr.

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Cartis looks like he's ready to jump through that, you know, and and tackle me. And that's fine. But you guys, you overborrow. You under under reportport your income. You over report your expenses. You're creating a thing. And

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and then we're arguing on what needs to be cut. M. Mr. Hutchinson and I have gone toe-to-toe. He's asked me several times, "What would you cut? What would you cut?" We remember that. I know you can't answer, but and I and I've stood here several times saying I don't want to cut anything. I want to do a proper

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budget. I've been coming to these meetings since 2014, 2015. By the way, those turf fields are need to be replaced are 10 years old now. Believe it or not, okay, there's another expense.

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But if we had $10 million, if we didn't borrow an extra 12 million to use on projects, I've done it before. I I came here and asked why we borrowed $450,000 for roofs over the last five years for the municipal building and then we only spent 200,000 of it. Where'd the other

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250 go? Not saying we're embezzling it. Probably went to other projects, but who knows where what projects because you're not required to tell us. But you borrowed for a roof back in 2021 and didn't fix it or didn't replace it until 2025. We paid interest on all those four

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years. That comes to the bottom line in this budget. All right. As Mr. Cardis has said several times, we have a A+ bond rating or a double whatever it is. And he and that's because we make our payments. Yeah, we're making our payments, but our payments could be

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lower. and none of you seem to care or you just don't realize it or you're being told by a puppet master. And I'll say it, you're being told what to do, what to vote because no none of you ask questions on it. And I don't mean it and and if you find that disrespectful, then

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so be it. But not one of you asks a question. Not one of you takes me up on my offer. Not one of you has taken any citizen up on their offer to come down and sit down and go over things.

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We're all in this together supposedly, but you guys sit up there and just and you'll probably cut the budget maybe 2% 3%. Still going to be over 10% of a budget of an increase.

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It's It's ridiculous. and it could be avoided by simple budgeting. It's called budgeting 101. And I'll be more than happy to email you guys my findings and all of this. And we can sit down before the next meeting. I'm an open book. And for the newer

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council members, I'll even get you the citizens budget and all the backup paperwork. It was a legitimate budget. That's all I got to say. Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you. Is there anyone else? I will close the public hearing. Um, for

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those that are new, I recap uh what was said by uh those that made comments. Before I do that, uh there may be some people in the room that have the impression uh when they saw it online of

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a 14% increase. So out of every dollar 3 um1 cents approximately 32 cents of every dollar comes to the township. >> Mr. Sweet, are you okay?

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>> No, I'm not. Are you okay? >> But no, I'm not. >> Okay, so because you're lying. >> No, you are. You're trying to spin it, Mr. >> Excuse me, Mr. Sweet. It's my time now. >> It's my time. Tell the truth.

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31.8% of every dollar goes to the township. You have over 53% that goes to the two school districts. The county is 21.2 cents of every

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dollar. So, if if you're taking 14 if you have a $10,000 tax uh bill and you're thinking that's a 14% tax increase, that's not a $1,400 increase from the township.

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If there's any increase of 14%, if that's the the budget number that we uh end up with, it's on 32 cents of every dollar. Uh so again, your tax bill is comprised of the school district, the county, and

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the municipality and the fire district. Uh so let's uh go. Mr. Paloro, um you uh you had a question regarding about the uh numbers that were transposed incorrectly

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in the Courier Post. Um not a lot of people read that. We had someone that brought it to our attention that it was 60 million rather than 69 million and that was corrected on the township's website. Is that correct, Mr. Cartis? >> It's also corrected in the Courier

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>> and also corrected in the Curry Post. Uh that was an error that was made uh when that was submitted to the Courier Post. Uh Mr. U I'm going to try to cobble all the comments that you made. Uh

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let's see. You had a lot. So let be bear with me here. Uh the beg borrow and steal it doesn't make sense. Uh we have to look at the budget in detail. Uh that council doesn't ask any

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questions and you can guarantee it. Uh questions are asked, Mr. Sweet. Just because it's not an email or a text, there are phone calls. We had a subcommittee that met with the CFO and also with Mr. Cartis. I have had

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conversation with Mr. Cartis. We speak about the budget. When I talk about the budget, there are two main factors that have prompted this increase. $3 million in healthc care coverage, an increase of $3 million. That's attributed to GLP1s.

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$3 million increase for our employees that have health insurance. Mr. Mr. Barrett talked about how important health insurance is. Correct, Mr. Barrett? So, there's a $3 million increase. In addition to that, the snow that snow

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the snow emergency that we had, there are people who like to go on social media, if you jumped on any site of any town in this area, everyone had an issue with snow removal. We spent $1 million on snow removal. That is $4 million.

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A $4 million increase over last year. A penny on the tax dollar is roughly $464,000. So if we didn't have a increase of $3 million for health insurance, if we didn't have a snow emergency of a million dollar because we haven't had a

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snow like this in over 10 years. Is that correct, Mr. Cartis? Going back to 2015. >> I don't recall two emergencies. Okay. >> So, we would be talking about a single digit increase in taxes. We have contractual obligations uh to our

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employees, to our unions. 80% of our budget is set in stone. There's the 20% of it is that what we get to play around with. Uh so, Mr. Sweet, when you make questions that you can guarantee that no one asks questions, I'm not sure you're

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in my head or in my home or listening to my phone calls. um you can form an opinion. You gave that opinion. Um regarding your citizens budget, uh that's something not a lot of people know about and and you've talked about

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it and um I know that Mr. Carter and our CFO at one point took a look at that citizens budget and they had their own thoughts on it and if they want to com it comment on that they can. Uh the

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let's see the capital budget Tom that was a little a shade under $10 million. The capital budget >> was it was a little bit above 10 >> a little bit above $10 million. So in that capital budget is included uh street repavements,

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sidewalks, acquisition of uh vehicles for the police department and for public works. uh there are recreational things that are included in that capital budget on a yearly basis. Uh and if anyone needs a detail of that, we could provide

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that to you. >> Uh uh Mr. has also talked about the pools and and the dues. So in that newsletter that goes out, people are made aware of the pool registration for the year. Mr.

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cars, you wouldn't happen have numbers for pool. They probably have not satisfied. I know it sells out. >> I don't know the final numbers. >> I believe it's around 90,000 in revenue. >> Okay. >> CFO is here. I don't know if she has those numbers.

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>> I don't want to put her on the spot because I don't have those numbers in front of me. >> Okay. All right. Um and you Mr. Sweet question. the cable TV fees, those things that that is it is they have to be anticipated in the budget. There's a

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line item in the budget for that and they're maximized. Whatever you receive, you have to anticipate. So, it's anticipated against the amount to be raised by taxation. >> Okay. >> Cable TV for what? For who? >> Franchise fee. >> There's a franchise fee. >> Folks, please don't shout out. There's a

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franchise fee that's paid by the cable company to the township. >> Okay. >> Okay. Uh >> okay, Mr. Sweet, please don't shout out. And please people, please don't shout out. Mr. Sweet, please. Mr. Sweet,

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please. No shouting out. No, that the public hearing. No. Next. Mr. Barrett, thank you um for your comments. You had talked about possibly having trash as a way to uh eliminate some of our uh costs, having trash

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picked up every two weeks or downgrading our our parks uh and made comments about cutting waste and cutting the newsletter. Uh taking the cars, the police cars to a mechanic. We have an in-house uh mechanic that's at public works uh that takes care of our

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vehicles. If something is beyond their scope, then it is sent out. Uh and um I'm glad you're here after your triple bypass. Okay. Godspeed. Uh Mr. Banano, thank you for your comments about uh tax and cuts and taking a look

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at it. Uh Mr. Torres, you had talked about the dispensaries. Mr. Torres, if you could provide me your email at the end of the meeting, I could provide you the dispensary costs that were brought in for the last two years because that has been asked uh frequently over the last six months. I could provide that to

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you. It's in the hundreds of thousand dollars, the dispensary that revenue that comes in from that. Uh, Miss Keegan, I probably pronounced your name wrong. Miss Kelsey, thank you. Four-year homeowner u, and you want to enjoy our parks and I told us about your

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struggles. Welcome to our community. Uh, uh, Miss Janice, that you have uh, retired and you own your home and you try to you're you waited till uh, you paid off all your debt. Uh, and I thank you for your concerns about seniors and um, we don't want our seniors to move

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out of our township. Um, and we're trying to make this as inclusive for everybody in our township. Uh, Mr. Polydoro, when you u, I missed your sarcasm the last six months. Um, I speak that as well. Uh, when you talk about

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uh, our spending, we have a spending problem. Um, and think about what we can cut and you keep referencing a barbecue planner. don't have a title of a barbecue planner in our budget. Um so, uh Miss Bonita, thank you for coming out

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for your comments. In the future, you cannot address the rest of you have to address council. That's okay. uh uh Miss uh Higgins um who's retired and uh she waited also to be debt free to retire

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herself and she's taking savings from uh money from her savings to pay her taxes and that there's a need for new fresh people uh here on council. Uh and and people have tried uh to do that. Um and unfortunately or fortunately um

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you know people have decided who sits up here. Miss Higgins, we have elections. Elections have consequences. That could be a good or bad thing as I say that there could be qu there could be consequences next year. Correct. So, >> okay. Mr. Norman, uh, who's lived here for seven, eight years, grew up in

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Blackwood, um, you identified a park that had graffiti. Mr. Norman, before, uh, before we leave here, can you give me the address of that park and we will have public works come out and take a look at that tomorrow. I have something to add on that. >> We we want to make sure there's no the public portion is closed, sir.

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>> Well, it's about the parks. >> The public port the public portion is closed. >> Okay. >> Okay. Uh so we'll take a look at that and address that for you. Uh Miss Hendris, um you talked about how Gloucester Township

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has used to be and uh um some of the things that we have here and the township has zero or nothing. uh and you talked about some of the things that you have to do. Uh Miss Hendricks, I could provide you and we could provide you some information on resources to help

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you um with some of the things that you need and you address uh in your public comments. >> Miss Roco, thank you. You moved here 32 years ago and your taxes are now $10,000. Um, and you are really good people and I I

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remember you from the the the sewer uh uh conversations that we had. Um, yeah, there's a lot of rumors about the sewer. There's some people who like to fan the flames about it. As we all know, it got throttled uh at at the at the voting uh

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polls. Uh we do understand there's a value to it uh to the sewer. Uh is that something that we could revisit? I'm not sure. But um but there is no intent to sell the sewer. Uh is it's part of our

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sewer utility right now to department and the sewer still flows. Uh so there are some people say, well, we want the MUA back. The MUA is the sewer utility and sewer still flows uh through our township. Um,

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and that is it for my recap. Okay. So, we have uh we had a public hearing. Uh, now uh you have to read we had a we didn't do a first and a second, did we? >> No. >> On 172. >> We did a motion. Yes. And then we went

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to the public hearing. >> Yes. >> So, we need to do a roll call on that. Correct. >> Yes. For resolution >> for We did We have to do the roll call >> for 172. Yes. >> Yes. We did the first and second. >> All right. May I have a uh we have a motion and a second. We had our public

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hearing. Now, the budget is not being adopted tonight because we have to have an amendment to it. So, the budget will once again be here on May 27th. If you like to be here Wednesday, May 27th at 7 o'clock p.m. I'll be here. We'll all be here. Okay. Uh roll call, please.

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>> Mr. Minion, >> yes. >> Mrs. Albreight Troxel, >> yes. >> Mr. Nash, >> yes. >> Mrs. Walters, >> yes. >> Mr. Castro, >> yes. >> Mr. Marcato, >> yes. Yes. And again, that is authorizing the township clerk to read the township budget by title only. And we had our

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public hearing. Now, we have resolution 2605173, resolution to amend the 2026 budget of the township of Gloucester, county of Camden, state of New Jersey. Uh this resolution will be available upon state approval. Madame Clerk,

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>> whereas the local municipal budget for the year 2026 was approved on the 13th day of April 2026 and whereas the public hearing on said budget has been held as advertised and whereas it is the desire to amend

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set approved budget which will be advertised on May 14th, 2026 and a public hearing on the amendment will be held on May 27th, 2026. Now therefore be resolved by the township council of the township of

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Gloucester County of Camden that the following amendments to the approved budget of 2026 be made. General revenues number six amount to be raised by taxation for support of municipal budget a local tax for municipal purposes

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including reserve or uncollected taxes. Sheet 11 from 69,94,263.85 to 69,47,378.80. Total amount to be raised by taxation for support of municipal budget sheet 11 from 69,94,263.85

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to 69,47,378.80. 80. Number seven, total general revenues sheet 11 from 90,334,7269 to $89,837,84164. General appropriations 8F judgments sheet 19 from $0 to $5,500.

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H1 total general appropriations for municipal within caps sheet 19 from 73,230,78 to $73,236,000 28 F judgments

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sheet 28 from $500,000 to zero H2 total general appropriations for municipal purposes excluded sheet 28 8 from 16,56,497.51 to $15,556,49751. O. Total general appropriations excluded

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from cap sheet 29 from $16,56,49751 to 15,556,49751. L subtotal general appropriations items H1 N O sheet 29 from 89,287,2551 to 88,792,7551.

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M res reserve for uncollected taxes sheet 29 from 1,47,5218 to1,45,136.13 n total general appropriation sheet 29 from 90,34,7269 to $89,837,841. $1.64

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H1 total general appropriations for municipal within cap sheet 30 from 733,230,78 to 73,236,28 F judgments sheet 30 from $500,000 to zero

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M reserve for uncollected taxes sheet 30 from 1,47,521.118 to1,45,136.13 9 total general appropriation sheet 30 90,34,7269 to 89,83789 million I'm sorry837,84165 4 cents.

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Be further resolved that a certified copy of this resolution be filled forth with in the office of the director of local government services for certification of local municipal budget. So amended. >> So all those numbers and the clerk is uh

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per is has to read that out loud to the public. uh is there's a reduction of $496,885. Uh and that had to be read as an amendment uh on on the budget that was submitted.

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>> We're going to vote on that. Yes. Okay. May I have a motion? I'll make that motion. >> Second >> on the question. >> Roll call, please. >> Mr. Man, >> yes. >> Mrs. Albbright Trail? >> Yes. >> Mr. Nash? >> Yes. To amend. >> Mrs. Walters? Yes, >> Mr. Castro. >> Yes, >> Mr. Marcato.

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>> Yes to amend. And again, there will be uh another hearing on May 27th, 2026 at 7:00 here in council chambers. >> Okay. Next is our GTE gov access email. Uh

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before I do that, Mr. Nash, we received an email from a resident, Miss Gentilly, that was sent to all council. Can you bring that up? I don't I'm going to read this. She didn't do it in a format of egov. It was an email to all of the council, but I'm going to include that.

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Okay. And then I'll have you read that when we get to it. Okay. Um, this is EGOV. If you're not able to make our meetings, you can send an email uh to council and council will read the email and address your concerns. This is from

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Valerie Smith of 4308 Aberdine Lane. Is Miss Smith here? Okay. All right. I reviewed the agenda for today's meeting, but I don't see any details regarding the proposed 2026 Gloucester Township budget. Someone posted on the Next Door app that the proposed budget includes a

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14.06 tax increase. Is that accurate? If not, what is the proposed tax increase percentage included in the budget? Can you provide context regarding the reason for the proposed increase? And how do we request a copy of the proposed budget?

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The amount to be raised uh by taxation in the 2026 introduced budget is 69,94,26385. That is an increase from the 2025 adopted budget of 60,96,9181. The introduced budget will be amended at the May 11th uh council meeting with a

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reduction of $496,885 to the proposed amount to be raised by taxation. Uh her question is what's the proposed tax increase percentage? That is a 13.25% increase. Uh and again this is for the

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local tax which is the municipality. We make up 32% of your entire tax bill. The municipality Uh so that includes uh in your tax bill though we collect for the school districts and also for the county uh the fire uh the library is

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part of that as well. uh the context regarding the reason for the proposed increase uh I had indicated the increase in health insurance costs and that is just not here that is in every school district in the state of New Jersey and also municipalities with the amount of

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health care increase some reaching up to 30% in increase Tom do you have a percentage of what that increase is >> I believe we were a little bit over 30 >> and we are self-funded if anyone knows about health insurance um a self-funded plan gives you greater flex flexibility

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uh than being out in the marketplace. Uh so that's a $3 million increase. The recent snow emergencies of $1 million, a decrease in our fund balance, which is our surplus, uh and then increases in trash removal and disposal. >> Just one comment on the health insurance

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because there was a gentleman I believe in the front row, uh mentioning about the employees paying for their health insurance. Uh we do in fact uh our employees do pay for their health insurance under chapter 78 that was part of Chris Christiey's administration. Uh

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so some of those employees uh getting family coverage are paying I believe in excess of $20,000 per year. Am I correct? >> Yes, that's correct. >> Okay. Uh and how do I request a copy of the proposed budget? The introduced

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state budget is available as a document to view and download on the Gloucester Township website. Mr. Nash, can you read that from uh Miss Jen Tilly? >> Absolutely. So, she does request that we read your response from Friday and my >> Okay, so let me get some context. Miss

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Jen Tilly had sent an email in. We have a township Facebook site and she was asking why are comments turned off on the Facebook site? uh and she had indicated this is a way for people to communicate uh with their representatives. My response to her at

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our last meeting is that uh individuals can attend a council meeting. They can contact any department that they wish to via phone. Uh they can email. There's a form also. If you want to report a pothole, you're able to do that. Uh we have public portions where people can speak and address concerns here. In

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fact, we had a resident last year that talked about a sewer, excuse me, last week, two weeks ago about a sewer issue in her community and that we're looking to resolve that for her uh that we were unaware of. Uh and she had indicated she

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had some additional questions that I I didn't get to that I failed to answer. So, do you have the email that I responded to? Go ahead. >> Uh yes. So, her first question was um please provide an answer as to why the township's Facebook page is listed as a business and not a government office.

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>> Okay. I had indicated to her I would try to get that information for her. Mr. Cars, um if you could get that when you create a Facebook page, there's different ways you could do as a community group organization. Um I'm not

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sure why it was listed as a business. Is that correct, Mr. Nash? That's what she had indicated. Okay. Uh she said her question is specifically about why the township chooses to use Facebook as an official communication platform while simultaneously preventing the public from commenting on those communications.

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Uh those are two separate issues. The existence of other contact methods does not address whether residents should also be permitted to engage on widely used public plat platform that the township itself has chosen to utilize for government communication. Facebook is mainly used by the township for

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communication to residents. There is a minimum engagement by the township on X website, podcast, Flickr, and Instagram. I understand that you don't speak for council. However, under the Faulner Act plan B, I understand administration may control the page operationally. At the

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same time, council is still the elected policymaking and oversight body representing the public. For that reason, I believe all of council does have a responsibility, a duty to at least review, discuss, or publicly address whether the restricting public

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interaction on official communication promotes transparency, accountability, and meaningful public engagement. So, respectfully, I am asking again, will council consider discussing or or reviewing the township's policy regarding public comments on an official social media communication?

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>> I'm only one member of council. C if any council member would like to address that uh we could discuss that at another time. Uh I you know I had talked about when the township had cancelled Loster

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Township day last year and then that was followed by uh the announcement of Junth. There was a lot of comments that were made um that were not very neighborly on that site. And I'm not a fan of some of these

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social media pages where there's a back and forth and there's a lot of misinformation that goes back and forth uh between individuals on those pages. Uh the the Facebook page that the township provides makes uh individuals and our residents aware of what's taking

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place in our township. I am personally okay with the comments being disabled. Our police department do not they do not have comments. They have comments disabled on there as well. Again, if you have an issue, you can contact any office. You can email council members.

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You can come to our meeting. Uh there's a text line, I believe, as well. You could fill out a form if you have a pothole or if you have a light that is out in your neighborhood. All those things are reportable. Uh I'm not a fan of someone going back and

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forth on the Facebook page uh being a keyboard warrior to be quite frank with you. Uh but that's just me. But if any council member would like to revisit that, again, that lies with the administration. Uh they could discuss that and we can discuss that at another

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time if they choose to. >> I agree. >> Thank you, Mr. Nash. Okay, that concludes our ego um polling of directors. >> Second public portion. >> Oh, I'm sorry about that. Thank you. We

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have a second public portion. This public portion is for 30 minutes. Speakers entitled to five minutes. Uh they may speak one time during that public portion. Miss Mr. Paloro followed by Mr. Sweet followed by Mr. Norman. >> Good evening once again. Ray Palora from

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historic village of Ariel. You offered the many opportunities to speak out. Uh Mr. Nash, thank you for the reading of that. That's uh I I find it to be most helpful. uh by no comments and what have you. Once again, you have have exemplified you are not interested in

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any way, shape or form in having a dialogue with the people of this township. I believe that started back when uh all the previous mayors used to come to the council meetings and our mayor decided he was going to forego that and uh that started the really don't care to hear from people the

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township and when you do uh your comments get uh get a little bit loose uh and then you make us do our comment and uh you don't want to go back and forth with that. What that does is it robs the opportunity for you to

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for us to humanize you to be a part of who we are. You are who we are. You just sit up there and you make the rules, you break the rules, you do whatever you want. And we've got to live with that. Whether it's ethical rules, whether it's moral rules, or whether it's just bad

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bad policy, you really don't care to talk back to us and have us speak with you and have a dialogue. That's human. That's normal. Maybe you want to reconsider that because we had some bantering. I'm not the nicest guy in the

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world and I don't want to be. But having a dialogue back and forth, I made Mr. Cartis's veins pop in his neck. I'd made Mr. Hutchinson almost blow vein out in the side of his head going back and forth me. That's healthy. Mr. Mcado said, "Yeah, I'm not

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interested in that." That's called a dialogue. It's also called freedom of speech. And just like I feel personally that I don't think burning my flag is way of free speech, Mr. Marcato has the right to have his opinion on free speech

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when it's inappropriate. Free speech doesn't give you the right to disrespect people. That's not what it was about. But you're not going to have that. That being said, and I'm sure I'm sorry, Mr. McCyle, he comes get to hear this. The lack of dialogue back and forth. lady

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came up here and explained the hardship that's going to be coming upon her from these tax increases. And you've heard this story before with the little lady that cried who could not afford her air condition. We don't need to go over that again. But this lady is now dipping into her life savings to be able to pay the

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property tax increases that you have already given her and those yet to come in the next every even number year which are great at. And in all the comments that people made and gave their heartfelt feelings to you, you breezed over everything in less

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than three minutes. You gave a smile and well yeah, you know, it's we're trying our best. And that with that woman's comment meant to you, we're doing our best. That sucked. That really did suck.

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There's people who have been harmed by what you're doing. And forget about the seniors. They got to pay it. and wait for it to come back. And again, I'm going to re-emphasize that property tax freeze is bull crap. They got to find the money

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and they got to wait for it to come back. But as we've gone through every even numbered year since 2014, we speak our mind. You do what you want. And doing what you want is passing it again. Now, if I'm correct, and correct me if

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I'm wrong, the state assembly and uh Senate now made it so that the township doesn't have to go back to a referendum for you to sell our sewer. Revisit it. It has value.

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You guys are part of a welloiled machine. You got everything planned out well in advance. You know what you're going to do 10 years from now. We've seen it. We know it. You know it. So, if you want to be upstanding guys, good

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guys and good girls, why don't you just go ahead and tell the people what the date is that you will sell the sewer system because you know what? It's there. You know it. And you know what? People are watching. Go ahead and shout

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out. They know it. They know it. It's It ain't a rumor, guys. What? That's what you wanted. You went through the motions. You let us have our our voices on the ballot. So, you can say you did it. Okay. I

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doubt it that I'm wrong, but you can reassure before the next 18 to 24 months is up. You'll get your wish. That $46 a quarter sewer bill, poof, gone. Will be whacked. It's what you do. It's what you've been

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doing. And sometimes you come up with nice little stories and things at the end of a good ship lollipop. How wonderful people are, but it doesn't take the pain away from what goes on to families that want to keep their families here. Thank you. >> Am I permit to come back up if no one

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else wants to speak? >> No. >> All right. This is Well, thanks for nothing. >> All right, Mr. Sweet, you had your hand up. I I stood up Sam Street from Ariel. I stood up here and asked a lot of questions and not a single one of them

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was answered. You kind of blew them off. Um that's what the I understand you know you don't want the banter but the banter helps with Hey, you didn't answer that question. put you guys on the spot. You

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guys are elected off you're our elected officials. You need to be held accountable. You didn't answer one of my questions like why we're not budgeting more than $90,000 for the pool fees when last year was $122,000. It's at 90,000 right now. Mr. Carter

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said that. So that means we know right now that the pool fees are going to be over $90,000. Why are we not budgeting more than that? Construction fees. He's budgeting 900,000. Last year was 1.2 million. Those are questions I'd like to get answered,

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but you took away the bannering. So, you can say what you want to say and not answer the question. I have to come back up here and waste my time and ask that question. Two, I'm 298 pounds, but my cholesterol is

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172. It's good, right? So, I can spin it any way we want. A 14% increase is still a 14% increase. Whether it's on 36% of our bill, whether it's on 50% of our bill, whether it's on 100% of our bill, it's

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still a 14 or 13.2% increase, it is still an increase, no matter how we slice it. And taxes have gone up every year under you guys. So, stop trying to spin it. My dad used to say, you know, a saying, I'm not going to say it here,

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but you know, you're spinning it to make yourselves feel better that, oh, it's only 31% of our taxes and 53% goes to the county and this and that and it's it's not 14% on a $10,000 bill. It's still a 14 13% increase. Bottom line.

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And the bottom line is that this mayor and you guys since you have taken office and yes, you've been elected, you have increased taxes over 120% since ' 09. That being said, what are we doing about the hitting cages?

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Okay, I know you can't answer that, but we got a grant for $750,000 hitting cages that were supposed to go on Glosser Township Park. I'm now being told that a playground is being moved to that softball field. The softball field has been cleared and a playground is being moved there. And right now, nobody

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has any answers to what's happening with the hitting cages. These are hidden cages that were promised to aerial little league. 75,000 was borrowed one year, 100,000 borrowed another year. Then it was told that 175,000 is going to go go to them. We're going to build

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township hitting cages. I have repeatedly asked to be included in on the plans of that because as you everybody well maybe you don't know but I'm well involved in aerial little league and baseball and it's one of my true one of my loves and

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I'd like to see it done right and I don't trust you guys to do it right because it's going to be a photo grab and a money grab. The mayor's already been on record saying that oh it's going to cost $ 1.5 million. Well, for $1.5 million, if it's the size of

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the black blackbox theater, you guys lost your money on that blackbox theater. That blackbox theater, if that cost $ 1.5 million for that size, for that that amount, and my daughter's in there all the time singing, there's no room in there. 68 pe

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what is it? 68 people can fit in there. You took them out of Camden County and put them in the Blackbox Theater for 68 people to watch. grandparents could not watch their grandkids sing at this holiday special because of a blackbox theater that you guys had to spend 1.5 million and didn't

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account for any room for families. So, I truly think you were going to ruin this as well. It's a it's a great idea. It's a great thing to do for the township kids. All right. Hitting cages, indoor hitting cages, indoor facility

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for fielding grounders. How many times have we been rain out of practice, Mr. Minion >> tons. >> Okay. Tons. All right. And we can't play baseball in the rain. Football. Yeah. All right. Baseball. We can't play in the rain. So, an indoor facility helps the kids,

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but I've asked to be included on it. And I get stonewalled because I stand up here and I state my mind. So, I'd like to be included. I'd like to be on record saying I'd like to be included in the plans of that to make sure it's done right. And what are the plans for that as well? >> My time's up. Thank you.

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>> Thank you. Is there anyone else? Mr. Norman. Hello again. Um, so like I said, this is my first meeting. Um, so I have a lot of questions, I guess, of just uh how to do some of these things. I just want to

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reference my phone for notes. Um, these guys might not like this, but I am very much interested in parks specifically. Like I said, the one around the the the corner from my house in Spring Valley off of Vance Sav, that's where it's uh they were doing some work and that's I spoke to the

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gentleman and he recommended I come to one of these meetings to voice my concerns about the park. But yeah, I mean, you know, teenagers hang out there, graffiti, there'll be trash, there'll be stuff like that. Some of the times it gets like overgrown. like my my daughter and my son like were pulling some thorns and got her scratched all

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up, that sort of thing. So, um I do want to uh maybe propose that that park uh I don't I don't know what the budget is or how those things get decided, but uh I'd like to suggest that park for a facelift or some work or uh that sort of thing.

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Um, the other thing is, um, I was very much interested in the dispensary budget that, uh, you said you could give the other gentlemen. Um, I wanted to provide my email for that just because I'm interested. Um, and then, you know, I I

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don't want to be on the opposite side of everybody here, but I will say that I do recognize a couple faces. I've seen you guys out in the wild. Obviously, Mr. Hutchinson. Uh we have a little bit of a history and and you know he was there for me at one point. I uh I don't know

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if he's okay with me sharing this, but you know, I will anyway. My mom um has been a I would say a decent enough person in the community. We met a while ago when he wanted to give her like an award for basically her efforts in the community. Um and that's how we actually

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got connected. Fast forward, you know, I was a kid at a crappy job. I got a suspended license. I started spiraling down the hole, driving while suspended, this, that, and the third. And at one point, you know, I I reached out to him. Um, I made it very clear that I I don't

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have any money, and he showed up anyway. Um, and he really helped me out, right? Because some of those things can really send you down a path. Now that I have money, and I, you know, I I see like it took me a while to dig out of that whole 500 credit score, that's all, that whole

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thing. But like I'm telling you, the good people when they they give you a hand sometimes really goes a long way. So thank you, Mr. Hutchinson. I don't think you guys are being uh as in human. You have a tough you have a tough job, man. I've been sitting here first time

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and listening to it. Um but that said, you know, uh like I said, I just want the things that, you know, the budgets are going up and these things are going up. I just like them to work. Um, like I said, that the park being one of them, if we're raising money for something or cost of

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something is going up, I'd really like to be able to see and be more involved with it. I'd like to get a copy of the judge the budget that uh Mr. You said you could provide and Mr. Sweet said he has a copy of. Um, I'd really like to take a look at that as well, but you

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know, I really I've seen Mr. Hutcherson go from I remember when he was a prosecutor way back. Uh, and so like I think I need to get involved. I need to I' I've been here since I was a kid. I'm going to try to stay in the community, grow with the

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community, and and be here for some of the dialogue that's happening. And, uh, I guess this is where I'm going to start. So, um, I don't know how this goes. Do we wait till the end? That sort of thing. Okay. And then you address everything. All right. Yeah. So, that's kind of what I'm looking for. But, uh,

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thank you very much, guys, and I appreciate your time today. >> Thank you, Mr. Norman. Is there anyone else? We'll close second public portion. Uh Mr. Paloro made his comments. He's left uh and he discussed about the lack

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of dialogue. Uh this is the uh second year that we have done this where we allow our residents make comments and when there's a back and forth uh sometimes those conversations were

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heated uh and there wasn't a lot of a lot of things were accomplished during those discussions. This permits the residents to make their comments and then we could respond to them. Sometimes we'll miss some of the questions that are asked. I'm constantly jotting down

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and I hope other members of council are doing that as well. U so Mr. Swisso if I didn't answer your questions we'll get you answers to those questions. U uh regarding the hitting cages uh Tom is

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that something that you could provide an update on? >> Yeah those the batting cages are moving forward. They are going to be located at GSA Township Community Park. I will reach out to uh John Pettit because Pettit engineering is still the engineer record on that project. Um it is uh

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funded at this point, fully funded. Um I forget how many lanes. I think there's four lanes and then an office in there. It is uh HVAC equipped. Um it is going to be a nice facility. Um and again, I will get back to you after I talk to Mr.

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Pett. >> Okay. Thank you. Uh and Mr. Norman. Uh, thank you. The budget you can is on the township's website. You can find that's under is under the clerk's uh page where >> on the down on the downloads list under

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downloads on the township's website for the budget where you can find that and the playground you refer to is in Spring Valley. >> Yes, sir. Off of Vance at >> off of Vance. Okay. Mr. Cars, can you send public works out there to take a

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look at that? Okay. both of >> and also um you can provide your email at the end. We'll send you that dispensary information as well. >> Okay. >> All right. Polling of directors now >> Mr. Hutchinson >> um

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the uh the anchor the stay program uh the governor did suggest changes. Believe an individual had asked questions about that. Um the uh I believe that the income limits will be reduced.

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Uh but we're going to fight like heck to prevent any other changes. >> Mr. Cartis, >> nothing to report right now. >> Chief Manazi, >> nothing. >> Mr. McIll, >> nothing to add. Thank you, >> Mr. Bach. >> Nothing to report. >> Miss Eric, >> nothing to report.

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>> Mr. Mun, >> thank you for coming. Thank you for the comments. And I know Ry had left, but it's nice to see him back on this good ship. Lollipop Chief, great job this week with the the awards. It was so nice to see the police uh and the staff be recognized. Great

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job. Have a great week and a great night. Thank you, >> Mrs. Troxel. Chief, congratulations. Uh you did a great job the other night. Very proud of you. Uh, I love our police chiefs because they keep us safe and that's most important to me at my age as

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a senior citizen that I heard all of you. >> I got it. Uh, also congratulations to public works. They've done an outstanding job and that um proclamation was spot on with everything it said about about public works. They they

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don't have an easy job. We have 26 square miles in this town. That's going back to Philly back and back again. That's a lot of space to to take care of. And we try to do the best we can with the budget to keep it under control

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so that we can have all the resources that we need and we take care of what we have. Uh the parks are important. I know some people don't want the parks, but one of our parks is for disabled children and part of that park is also for senior citizens. So, we're taking

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into account all ages when we do things and we're really trying our darnest to to get everybody included in everything that we do because we realize the taxes are hard. We too all pay taxes and that's why we try and keep them as low as we can because we're paying them too.

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And we don't have those big big buck houses and I don't have a big buck job at all. I don't even have a job. This is it kids. So, I just want you to know that we are doing the best we can and we do care. Each and every person here I've talked to and we've all talked to each

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other and we really do care about the people and we are really are trying to do the best we can under the law. That's the key. There's so many different laws that we have to follow that Tom has to follow. I was on the budget committee

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and we learned a lot, didn't we, Jim? And I think Jim's eyes were rolling in his head because all the rules and regulations that we have to follow are difficult to try and keep the taxes down. But uh under Tom's toutelage

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and um this lady over there, we did a pretty good job. We cut a lot. We did cut a lot. Uh it may not look like it to you, but we did. We spent two over two and a half hours trying to cut this budget. And this budget

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is long. It's a couple hundred pages. So, I just want to thank you all for coming. I appreciate your comments. Whether they were good, bad, or ugly, I still appreciate them because I believe in free speech. Thank you, >> Mr. Nash. >> Yeah, same thing. Thanks for coming out

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and and to address Sam, we absolutely do care. You know, I Well, you may not believe it, but we do. We're taxpayers just like you. We're we have we are dealing with the same things you're dealing with. Gas prices are high. We have high insurance rates. We truly do care. We go through the budgets. We ask

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tons of questions. Whether they're on email or not, we have tons of questions. I've called Tom four times this week. We care. We're doing our best. Do we like to see tax increases? Absolutely not. And we're going to do everything we can to not have them, but there are things

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outside of our control. And health insurance is one. Gas prices go up, they're up a ton right now. You can't, what are you going to do? Protest outside of Waw Wa because the gas prices are up. You just got to kind of take it on a chin. We all do. These are the same things that are being imposed upon us.

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Still stinks. I still think we can do better and I think we will do better, but it's we do care. That's all. Have a good night, >> Mrs. Walters. Uh, I want to thank everybody for coming out tonight. Um, thank you public works. um through the year, whether it's a snowstorm, whether

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it's a rainstorm, um people do contact me and they do get back to me and they go out to um the person's house to see what they can do. So, I appreciate all that they do, responding to my phone calls um and responding when I do call them. I appreciate everybody coming out,

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the comments. This hits um I have my mother's a senior. She's 80. She lives in the same house that I grew up in. So, I understand I'm a middle-ass family. I got three kids. kids. I got three jobs. So, it's like picking up extra hours to make up the difference. We do what we

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can. I go to I go to shop right. I want to die when I'm at the at the register. >> They just see me with my mouth wide open. I understand. Um but I understand we need to do what we have to do as well. See where we can cut, see where we can do better, see what we can change.

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Um I'm all for that. But um you know we trust in the budget and to see what works um and what doesn't work. So we have to revisit things. Um but I appreciate it. I understand. I'm one of you. I'm a taxpayer. So I appreciate it everybody coming out and sending their

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comments. Um and we do take it to heart. And when you say there's no emotion, there is emotions inside. There are emotions inside. You don't know me, but there are emotions inside. My heart breaks for

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people, okay? I do what I can just, as I said, I work three jobs. I leave my three kids six, seven days a week to do it. >> So, I completely understand. >> Thank you, Mr. Sweet. I appreciate it. >> Mr. McConna, can I make one more

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comment? >> Sure. >> Uh, I heard some people say that they were uh food is insufficient. They they needed some help. Well, my church, Choose United Methodist Church in Glendor on the Black Horse Pike, gives away a box of food to people in this

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township one day a month. And it's a lot of your basics, and it will help you. Their phone number is 939107, Jews United Methodist Church. Please call them. They'll give you the particulars and they will help you.

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Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you, >> Mr. Castro. Thank you for everyone for coming out. Thank you for bringing your concerns to us. Uh, one thing I do want to appreciate for those that were able to do it is controlling your emotions under these circumstances. Uh, sometimes it's

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not easy for people to do that and even to even have something reciprocated without trying to allow them emotions to get the best of them either. U, let's all just be respectful. We're all here to do a job and we're all doing it to the best of our ability. So, just thank

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you for coming out and I will see you in a couple of weeks. Have a good night, >> Mr. Mata. >> Thank you for coming out this evening and thank you for your comments. I entertain a motion to adjurnn. >> Motion. >> Second. >> All those in favor? >> I have a good evening everyone.