PILOT Program Will Cost Bloomingdale More, Former Councilwoman Says

The following is a Letter to the Editor submitted by former Bloomingdale Councilwoman Linda Huntley. If you'd like to submit a Letter to the Editor, send it to ariana.cohn-sheehan@patch.com

Dear Editor: 

This year the Borough of Bloomingdale is at a cross road. If the Republican candidates are successful, there will remain a Republican majority.  If the Democrat candidates are successful, the council will once again have a Democrat majority. 

Remember, under Democrat control, your taxes doubled and services were cut! Under this Democrat mayor, council meetings are contentious, if not unruly.The Democrats keep saying the PILOT program, their “tax loophole,” is going to save you. This “tax loophole” gives developers huge tax breaks and takes the developers’ school taxes and gives it to the municipal budget. This permits municipal spending outside the 2 percent cap, which can be used to hide spending at the same time depriving our schools of the money they need to educate our children! What’s worse is that you will have your property taxes increased to cover the shortfall to subsidize these tax breaks…and why? For no reason other than the municipal budget getting access to these funds so they do not have to stay in the 2 percent cap. This “tax loophole” was negotiated by the Democrat mayor and the budget chair. The same budget chair who told us our taxes went down $85 this year. Did your taxes go down this year?

Here are some more of the lies told over the past year by your mayor and the current Democrat council members:

• Last year’s attorney cost the taxpayers almost $220,000. This is not true, the total cost was $125,000, which included $20,000 to the mayor’s attorney. What’s worse is that before election season last year the mayor actually said that our last attorney was going to cost the borough over $400,000 and the Democrats actually ran their campaign on that lie!
• They claimed that the Republicans voted against bonding to help the flooding in town. This is not true, that bonding is in place and work is being done to alleviate the flooding. 
• They claimed that there had to be over $200,000 in bonding for an underfunded budget. This is not true, there was sufficient funding in the budget, it was never properly used.
• They claimed that the council refused to negotiate with the police.  This is not true, the mayor was responsible to negotiate the contracts. In fact, it was the mayor’s fault that negotiations didn’t occur and his failure necessitated $40,000 in attorney’s fees that he criticized.

Now they have the audacity to say they are going to save you with the PILOT program. Make no mistake, money does not grow on trees. If millions of dollars in tax breaks are being given to a private developer, the money to educate all the children who live in town and the Avalon Bay apartments must come from somewhere and it will, it will come from you!

Vote for those who have no personal agenda! I believe Jo-Ann Pituch and Michele Siek will do their best for you and our town.   

Sincerely, 

Linda J. Huntley

Bloomingdale