Only four Jersey City residents offered their thoughts on the proposed $469 million city budget during a public hearing at last night's City Council meeting.
The residents, three of whom are regular critics of the city administration, mostly offered a negative view of the budget, which comes with no municipal tax increase.
Yvonne Balcer raised objections about the city's compensated absence liability, or the amount of money the city owes workers for unused sick and vacation time. If the city's entire workforce retired today, the city would owe $64.6 million for unused absences.
"The city's in bad shape," Balcer said.
Jayson Burg, who is seeking a seat on the Board of Education, questioned why the city was budgeting $5 million in savings for a possible merger of the Jersey City Incinerator Authority and the Department of Public Works, when an independent consultant said the merger could save the city $10 million.
Burg's question went unanswered last night, but Mayor Jerramiah Healy has called the $10 million figure "several years old" and likely "inaccurate."
Dennis Overend asked the council to require the city to send out annual tax bills instead of releasing them quarterly. Meanwhile, Riaz Wahid questioned why the city budget projects skyrocketing unemployment claims, from $494,000 last year to $1.5 million in 2012.
City Assistant Business Administrator Robert Kakoleski blamed last year's roughly 300 layoffs. "People are collecting unemployment," he said.
The council has given tentative approval to the budget. No date has been set for its adoption.
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