For the first time in several years, Lakewood residents will be paying more in taxes. The average home in Lakewood will see an increase of around $160 per year due to the tax increase. Mayor Ray Coles says that the increase is necessary to budget for normal rises in health care costs and pensions, new police officers, and a new shift that has been added to the Department of Public Works.
“We were unfortunately unable to keep taxes at the same levels like we have for the past few years. But this increase will allow us to have our police department fully staffed, and Public Works will be able to faster make improvements around town, especially on our roads,” the mayor told TLS.
Lakewood added 13 new police officers at the beginning of the year in order to better serve the growing population. The new officers will provide better police coverage across the township and will improve police response time. The new shift at the DPW is aimed at helping to improve services around Lakewood, especially on the roads, many of which are crumbling and need attention as soon as possible.
The mayor added that in the long run the added expenses at the Department of Public Works will save Lakewood hundred of thousands of dollars by allowing to keep local services in-house without needing to outsource the jobs at a much higher cost.
Lakewood’s budget for the fiscal year will be a little over $101 million dollars, with $64 million of those funds coming from taxes on Lakewood’s residents.
Even after building so many houses with a minimum of $13,000.00 per house they still need to raise taxes?
Shouldn’t the added construction be able to cover the additional services required?
yes, that was one of the reasons why the zoning/planning committees allowed for all this construction in the first place. Eventually they realized that the quality of life of all the pre-existing residents had stooped so low and enough was enough. There have been less developments approved in recent years. Perhaps the township is banking on the Eagle Ridge to streamline some dough, but hey, let’s stop the chaos before it’s too late. Also, township needs to be stricter with Performance Bonds and Subdivision Bonds. Developers are taking Town Hall and all of us living here for one huge ride!
We have barely any violent crime and almost no traffic enforcement so what is the purpose of all the additional high paid officers. Why are barriers not utilized rather than officers to patrol construction areas and similar? We love our officers but more of them is not the most pressing need for Lakewood at this moment in my opinion. All the additional construction should be bringing in mountains of new tax revenue as well so when will the day come when every line item of the Lakewoods expenditures and revenue is put on the township site for viewing?
our men in blue are constantly responding to accidents around the clock. (Many downed wires, broken traffic signals, and all those water main breaks too) We have many busy state and county roads that cross through our lovely little town, so there is always stuff going on. (many DUI’s, for example, especially on the weekend)
When you see an officer in uniform at a Construction Area/ Site they are working on their days off and the Developer or Untility company is paying the township for the LP officer work. NOT THE TAX PAYERS>
So, in other words, they could not raise the assessed value of the properties, so they raised the basic tax rate. Either way, our taxes go up each and every year. Each year we are promised better services for the increased payments. And each year, it is the same old, same old. What I don’t understand is why, with all the new developments being built every year with its increased source of revenue, is that not sufficient?
What a shame!
Why are homes in Jackson and Toms River with same or greater value taxed at about one third of the rate that is in effect in Lakewood? Does Lakewood have so many more officers/DPW services that would justify that difference?
Lakewood Needs These officers and DPW services. The police department as a whole should have 1 officer for ever 1000 residents, they are way behind the power curve on this. Older officers are retiring and the younger ones are barely ready to tackle 30 years on the streets of Lakewood. The DPW is struggling to keep up with the demand. Imagine running 2 full shifts of garbage trucks & manpower to compensate and keep up with the ever growing town you live in. This town is growing by leaps and bounds and Your Emergency Services are trying to grow with them, the volunteers are struggling to keep up. More Daytime emergencies prevent some of them coming, they have to support their families. Where does it end?? I know you have to raise taxes. IN the past we have seen houses going up that are “mini” Mansions. I grew up here never thought I would see 500 & 600 thousand dollar homes in Lakewood..Never!! what do you think that does to the infrastructure here?? just sayin
If you check our tax map you will see how many properties are tax exempt. The more properties tax exempt the more taxes the tax payers have to pay. We have the most tax exempt amount of properties in the county, therefore the tax burden falls on the few that still pay property taxes.
Our taxes go up EVERY year – whether local, county, school, etc.
Once BMG closes on the 115 acre golf course property, that land will
come off the tax rolls. Guess who picks up the tab?!
Our taxes have gone up every year. Just not from the township side. And the amount off the increase is misleading because most people in our community’s houses are assessed at more than the average.
DPW should be downsized.(the street sweeper rarely comes by,then suddenly comes consecutively 3 days in a row!!) And we don’t need to build the fanciest Town Hall either. We also need better county representation. Lakewood does not get it’s fair share from the county.(Maybe it”s about time to vote in a county freeholder from our town, i think we would have enough votes.). Let’s put spending proposals on the ballot allowing the citizens to decide how we spend our dollars!!
I also never was able to understand how the increased building which brings in increased Revenue why does that not cover the extra expenses?
The mayor is quoted as saying that the extra spending on Public Works will save money in the long-term If that’s the case why do we need the higher taxes to pay for it? if it’s going to save the money that means it’s not costing anything and if the savings is not as much as the expenditure then why are we doing it?
That’s a good point. It reminds me of when the mayor promises to continue working to get the state to widen route 9, but then comes back to state that studies suggest that widening the road will bring more traffic as more people will attempt to use it. So “it’s not so bad after all”!!!
I think I’m just gonna move back to Boro Park. Twice a week Garbadge pick up, erev pesach Garbadge pick up, police driving around BP on shabos, better shuls, more minyunim, late shabos morning minyan etc. the list goes on… Paying a large chunk of tax? For what? For whom?
We have reached the same conclusion. Back to Brooklyn where we have public transportation, better shopping and schools for the children that do not require 3 hours of inconsistent bussing every day.
@jared, the township doesn’t pay the officers at construction sites. Those officers are paid by the construction companies
I stopped many years ago voting for incumbents! We have to vote out every mayor and councilman every year until the taxes go down. Period. They will get the message really quick. Enough is enough.
Just sitting here comparing my municipal taxes from 2011/12 to 2018/19 and found my municipal taxes have gone up less than $300.00 over that time. That’s not bad considering we added more police and now will have 3 shifts of DPW besides higher pension payments and the constant bailout of the public school system. If people were so concerned about their taxes maybe they should have shown up at the committee meeting this past Thursday when the budget was open for discussion. But no, there were only two of us there and the meeting opened and closed within the hour. Keep in mind the taxes that you pay are not all going to the town. When figuring the percentage the townships cut of your total taxes is about 28 percent. School tax is nearly double that and county close to 2/3rds. Read your tax bill and you will get a better appreciation of how it actually works. Also consider this, Jackson residents pay for their trash disposal, they don’t have leaf pickup but once a year, bulk pick up isn’t monthly like ours and street sweepers are virtually non existent on many streets. Lakewood needs to make the industrial areas for businesses, not schools and stop giving sweetheart deals to the developers when they purchase public land. Eventually there will be no more land to sell to keep the small budget surplus and that’s when you will see the tax spike.
You must no someone in the assessors office, because my taxes have gone up over 40% in the same period of time
The reason why taxes will keep going up is because of all the people living in Toms River, Jackson Etc. who utilize our infrastructure (roads, Shuls, schools) on a DAILY BASIS. They pay ZERO taxes to Lakewood yet benefit tremendously from our tax dollars. Stopping development in Lakewood won’t help our tax rate. Building schools in Jackson and Toms River will.
We defiantly need to change the government to a council like Toma River and larger muncipulaties… we can have Lakewood run the same way as it was 30 years ago when it was a sleepy little town.. we need a mayor and council. We must demand change so we can have effective government for the people by the people
I actually think we have to many police officers in this town, every time a silly old lady is pulled over there is a minimum of 2 police cars hogging up the road etc. Thank g-d we dont have a crime issue here and we really didn’t ask for any more officers (although we love them)
we can get rid of some liquid salt (brine) trucks that just drive around all winter spraying our roads for no reason at all, and between ,me and you I think this town has way to many police cruisers and officers and sice we are a generally safe community we simply dont need so many officers
after hundreds of house have recently been erected adding millions more tax dollars, taxes should actually be falling!
Spelling correction.. GARBAGE !!!!