To the Editor:

This front page article [“Budget Waivers Would Allow District to Exceed 2 Percent Property Tax Cap,” Town Topics, March 16, page one,] starts with a question, reportedly posited by the Board of Education to the property tax paying part of the public, equating failure to support their ignoring the state’s property tax cap to our failing to support “all the education they (high school students) need,” and, by implication, anything else the Board considers part of that education, including whatever politically correct topic they want to insert; multi-culturalism, transgender issues, global warming, topic “au courant,” without regard for time lost for basic education. The Board then challenges us to oppose its ignoring of the reality of the economics of our times. There is a New Jersey State law mandating a “cap’” on spending, instituted for very economically sound reasons. There is a finite limit to the amount of money available from the taxation of the few, property tax, rather than all, income tax, as the source of funding for education. The question raised by the Princeton Board was whether or not the “average homeowner” was wiling to “guarantee that all students at Princeton High School … have all the teaching they need for a few dollars more on their annual property tax bill? What about the rest of the community as a whole? Property tax payers are challenged not to “begrudge the extra amount.” Could not the property taxpayers ask the Board not to “begrudge” re-nogiatiating contract terms to share the burden? The school system in Princeton has traditionally ranked well in New Jersey and nationally; however, I posit that its ranking has as much to do with the demographics of the community, both homeowners and non homeowners, as well as the incentives and support our students get at home, as it does with the amount of money we the taxpayers collectively threw at the system.

An additional and EXTREMELY important issue is the share of responsibility for this major component of property tax in Princeton. Our neighbor, Princeton University, is a private, for-profit institution, a property owner, a major commercial property holder and landlord, recipient of educational grants (perhaps including federal moneys?) whose graduate student’s children are educated in our schools, at our expense. It has an endowment in double digit Billions of dollars. However, it is exempt from property tax and condescendingly, and reluctantly, contributes, in lieu of taxes, an annual, negotiated sum that many consider very far below the value the University receives. It is a dominant force in local politics (moving the Dinky, our mayor having to recuse herself from issues concerning the University, for example), but not a dominant force in local financial support. As tyrannical as “taxation without representation” is, equally so is “representation without taxation.”

Enough is enough. Consolidation of the Borough and Township accomplished little in terms of tax relief and if the BOE exempts itself from the equation, the hoax is complete.

Marc Malberg

Autumn Hill Road