In today's Trenton Times, there was an article on page 10 with the title: "Towns must stop dishing out tickets just to raise cash" by Richard M. Hoover (a guest columnist from (ironically) The Institute for Justice). It inferred rather clearly that our town practices "taxation by citation" as a means to balance a municipal budget. We do not. I sent him the following email this morning, and I wanted to share it with you all because....frankly....I'm tired of the unjustified attacks....and being quiet and hoping these attacks just go away or are forgotten....well, it just ain't me.
Mr. Hoover:
I read your article today with great disappointment. Had you bothered to contact me to make a
simple inquiry regarding whether or not there is any validity to the civil
action filed by the 6 Lawrence Township police officers, I would have told you
some facts that may have caused you to not disparage Lawrence Township as you
did.
First, as a former Municipal Court judge in our Town, I
completely understood the impact that the New Jersey Supreme Court’s position (and
policy changes) would have regarding
revenue generated by municipal courts (from motor vehicle stops), and that our Town
should not be relying upon levels of revenue generated in the past in future
budgets forecasts. It is clear that that
source of revenue (one of many in a municipality) would be down. In our particular circumstance, the reduced
revenue from our court (and our impound yard) was offset by increases in revenue
from other departments (i.e., construction office and permits, etc.). This allowed
us multiple budget years to get an accurate estimate of revenue that will be
generated by our court (and impound yard) so we can do accurate budget
forecasting. This is what responsible
municipal governments do.
In addition, if you had asked, I would have told you that the problem that we were experiencing from our Police Department was that we
had officers that in my opinion simply refused to work because they were either upset about
some union dispute (our police department uniquely has 2 unions...which has proven to be a disaster for many reasons) and/or our former
police chief because of how he treated his police officers in general.
In our Town of 34,000 residents, 22 square
miles, with more than 125 miles of roadway (that includes Route 1, I 95, Route
206 etc), our police officers had consistently made approximately 8000 motor vehicle stops annually (a number well
within national averages). In 2018, that
number dropped to approximately 5100. Our
revenue from our storage facility went from $145,451 in 2016 to $77,328 in
2018. This represented a ridiculous drop
in traffic enforcement. Speeders were
able to speed without risk of being stopped….drunk drivers drove without risk
of being stopped……uninsured and unregistered vehicles were sent on their way if
they even had been stopped in the first place. Basic traffic safety in our Township was being compromised. I can’t tell you how many calls I received
from residents complaining about speeding on their streets and never seeing a
police car around.
In response, there
were concerted efforts (including seeking guidance from the NJ Attorney General’s
Office) to get the police officers back to working…..to being productive….to
earning their salaries that tax payers were paying….and to honor the oath that
they took when they became a law enforcement officer. It had NOTHING to do with revenue generating. As difficult as you may find this, I don’t
come from a finance background. My
decisions don’t start and end with the mighty dollar. I actually worry and put emphasis on what is
the right thing to do in all respects to municipal government operations (to respect
and value our residents and our employees and make decisions that reflect that)….including
police department operations. Lawrence
Township does NOT rely upon “taxation by citation” to balance its budget.
So I take offense to you disparaging our police and
administrative officials in your article without bothering to determine whether
it had any basis in fact. This is
apparently the world we live in now, but I thought you should know at least one
person cares about the reputation of our community, our police chief and the
officials who run the municipal operations. The next time you do an opinion article, may
I suggest you make some attempt to verify your position.
Below is a link to a blog post regarding the police civil
action that you may find interesting:
https://lawrencetownshipnjmanagerkpn.blogspot.com/2019/10/the-police-officers-lawsuit.html
Kevin P. Nerwinski, Esq.
Municipal Manager/QPA – Township of Lawrence
2207 Lawrence Road
PO Box 6006
Lawrenceville, NJ 08648
Direct – 609.844.7005
Fax – 609.895.1668
www.lawrencetwp.com
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