Lakewood's Township Committee this past year granted short and long-term tax abatements to 36 new commercial buildings around town. These tax cuts have resulted in a loss of over $5.77 million in tax revenue for this past year alone.
To make up for this lost revenue, the Township Committee is now planning on increasing our property taxes for the coming year by over $3 million. A typical new duplex will see a $560 increase to their total annual property tax bill.
The total annual tax bill for FY '22 for an average new duplex in the Oak and Vine neighborhood, assessed at $577,200 was $13,050.49. Of this amount, $4,046.17 funded the municipal budget, $5,893.21 funded the school budget, $467.532 funded the fire budget, and $2,643.576 funded the county budget.
The total annual tax bill for FY '23 for a similar new duplex will be $13,610.376, which represents a $559.88 increase. Of this total amount, $4,161.61 will fund the municipal budget (an increase of $173.16 from FY '22), $5,945.16 will fund the school budget (an increase of $51.95 from FY '22), $577.20 will fund the fire budget (an increase of $109.67 from FY '22), and $2,926.40 will fund the county budget (an increase of $282.83 from FY '22).
The total tax levy for the municipal budget for Fiscal Year 2022 was $75,237,426.38. The tax rate was $0.701. This is the amount in taxes that you pay per $100 of your property's assessed value.
The Township Committee introduced the FY '23 municipal budget at their last meeting. They will hold a public hearing and adopt the final budget at their next meeting.
The municipal tax levy for the proposed FY '23 budget is $78,472,923.65 - a $3,235,497.27 increase. The tax rate is $0.721.
This increase would not be necessary had the Township Committee not granted numerous long and short-term tax abatements this year.
The Township Committee has granted 5 year tax abatements / Payments in Lieu of Tax (PILOT) to 21 properties around town. (These properties pay 0% the first year, and then slowly increase 20% each year for the next 5 years). These properties are assessed at a total of $240,345,500.00 and would have paid a total of $5,410,177.21 in taxes for FY '22, however due to the abatements they are paying only $1,038,855.26, which is a non-payment of $4,371,321.95.
The Township Committee has also granted long-term tax abatements / Payments in Lieu of Tax (PILOT) to 15 properties, mostly located in the Cedarbridge Corporate Campus. These properties are assessed at a total of $147,593,100 and would have paid a total of $3,195,186.45 in taxes for FY '22, however due to the abatements they are paying only $1,790,713.74, which is a non-payment of $1,404,472.71.
In total, the Township Committee has granted tax abatements to 36 properties. They are assessed a total of $387,938,600 and would have paid a total of $8,605,363.66 in taxes for FY '22, however due to the abatements they are paying only $2,829,569, which is a non-payment of $5,775,794.66.
This is an increase from the amount of tax cuts the Township Committee granted last year. For FY '21, the Township Committee granted tax abatements to 32 properties. They are assessed a total of $241,418,100 and would have paid a total of $5,485,019.23, however due to the abatements they paid only $1,235,226.99, which is a non-payment of $4,249,792.24.
Had all these properties been assessed their full taxable value, our taxes would have actually decreased. Instead, our taxes are increasing to make up for the lost revenue.
This municipal budget is only one of 4 portions of our single tax bill, which also the budgets for the Lakewood Board of Education, Fire District, and Ocean County. Not all of these budgets have been finalized yet. However, the Township estimates the total tax levy of these other budgets to be $178,159,177.06. Combined with the municipal budget, the total tax levy will be $256,632,100.71.
The total tax levy for FY '22 combined with the municipal budget was $246,969,170.14.
As the other budgets are yet to be finalized, the total tax rate for our entire combined property tax bill for FY '23 has not yet been finalized by the Township Tax Collector, however, based on the Total Taxable Valuation of all taxable properties in Lakewood, which, as of October 1, 2022 is $10,886,899,800, the Tax Collector has estimates that the total tax rate will be $2.358. The actual total tax rate in FY '22 was $2.261, so this represents a $0.097 increase to the tax rate.
For FY '22, the Total Taxable Valuation of all taxable properties in Lakewood was only $10,744,753,700.00.
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3 comments:
Why are we giving pilots to anybody ???
In this overheated lakeood real estate market, does anybody really think these projects would not be built without a govt handout?? The buidlings are all 100% pre-leased before a shovel is even in the ground. The developers are just laughing at us.
This article mainly addresses how the tax abatements granted in 2022 are causing 5.77m in lost revenue. However, the situation is worse than mentioned - if looking at lost revenue in 2022 from abatements and PILOTs that were granted before 2022.
We're not just paying for the new 2022 handouts, we're still paying for old handouts as well. I'm curious how much that added up to in 2022.
Duplexes now go for over $1million. So it will be double!
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