Merge or risk losing state aid, New Jersey warns communities

Merge or risk losing state aid, New Jersey warns communities

CHESTER, N.J. (AP) — It’s a response to the recession and dwindling state aid that seems deceptively logical: Neighboring towns can merge into one to streamline services and save money.

Problem is, it’s rarely done, though the concept is being studied in many states, including New Jersey. But to make it work, towns have to be willing to reduce staff and services, and they risk losing their identities and their independence — and few seem to be willing to do that.

In Utah, officials have discussed making one city out of five towns north of Salt Lake City, and the eastern Massachusetts towns of Hamilton and Wenham have studied a merger. In Idaho, a proposed union of the resort towns of Ketchum and Sun Valley was scrapped last month after strong resistance from residents of Sun Valley, a world-renowned ski resort.

Some New Jersey lawmakers believe they’ve found a solution in having their cash-strapped state act as an ersatz Match.com for towns looking to merge.

The state is offering to pay for studies and give a property-tax credit to homeowners whose taxes would rise. The aim is to save money and escape Gov. Jon S. Corzine’s plans to slash aid to more than 300 towns with fewer than 10,000 residents.

If that doesn’t work, these towns risk losing state aid.

“Whenever we’ve tried to bring people to the altar it hasn’t worked; what we need is a few shotgun weddings,” said Assemblyman Reed Gusciora, D-Princeton, who wants “doughnut hole” towns — small boroughs surrounded by larger townships — to share services or merge within the next decade.

The small towns of Chester borough and Chester Township, nestled in the rolling hills of west-central New Jersey, provide a good example of the problems in making these forced marriages work.

Relations between the two towns are friendly. Children in both towns attend the same schools and check out books from the same library. A single fire company handles calls for both towns. They pay for other services separately, including police and a total of two mayors and 10 council members.

The fact that they are separate exemplifies what many see as a critical problem in a state where a whopping 566 municipalities vie for a shrinking pot of state aid and home- owners suffer property taxes that are double the national average.

Chester Township Mayor William Cogger called the issue “the 800-pound gorilla in the room” — are towns willing to study a merger in earnest if it means one might disappear?

“From a sociological standpoint, we’re one community ... but if the economics don’t work, the merger won’t work,” Cogger said.