The Mount Holly news. [volume] (Mount Holly, Burlington Co., N.J.) 1891-1942, 1912-01-23
That Resolution.

at the January meeting of the Board o
Freeholders a resolution was adopted
making the budget for county expenses
the present year, $211, 900 This, it Il
commended, is wrong, as the amount stateC
to be necessary to raise by taxation il
$191 900, the balance to be made up from
other resources which will be availabl,
during the year. All these facts have beer
published and Budd M. Rigg, solicitor O.
the Board, felt it his duty to CRITICS,
some of the publications and in his repl,
or defence of the resolution he said the
Mount Holly correspondent of Burling
ton paper proved himself to be in ne
wise familiar with merely the facts.
This, of course, opened the way fol
reply and the correspondent "went
back" and showed that possibly Solicitor
Rigg needed brushing up on figures. The
correspondent did not cover all the
ground, however. In his statement Mr.
Rigg tried to show that the Board OF
Freeholders have reduced the appropria
tions from $274, $50 So in 19O4-19O5 to
1886, 210 in 1911. This is not correct
Under the law, prior to 1909, the Board OF
Freeholders was required to include in
the budget the amount of school money,
surplus revenue, etc., and that went to
make the sum total. After 1909 the law
took part of the budget out of the hands
of the Freeholders, hence there was quite
a pairing down of the appropriations
AS an example Mr.. Rigg figures that
the appropriations for 190419O5 were
1914 656 So But in those figures was the
sum required for state school purposes
Now, If the appropriations for 1911 are
looked into and to the sum of 1886, 80 is
added $SS, 728. 1O-the school tax that
must be raised-it will be seen that the
total is $269, 95S 10, very little below the
figures of 1905.
Then Mr.. Rigg showed his lack of famil-
iarity with figures when he asserts that
the net valuations on which the county
taxes were apportioned aggregated $751;
845, 1877. If he will examine the law he
will find that the County Board of Tax
alton is required to deduct from the net
valuation of assessable property all
amounts allowed on appeal. Then If be
will look at the abstract of ratables made
up by the county board he will find two
items. One is met valuation taxable
and under the head he will find the figures
he has quoted, but if he will look little
further on he will see that $2S, 400 had to
be taken from that net sum, and then he
will see an item headed "Net valuations
on which county and state school taxes
are apportioned, and see that $31,
S45, 1877 was the sum used for that pur-
pose.
The resolution may be all right, but it
does not have that look to the innocent
In little card issued by the
clerk of the board there is statement that
notwithstanding $211, 900 was voted by
resolution, only $191 900 is to be raised by
taxation. But the question naturally
arises what resolution or amount will the
county collector certify to the county
board and if $211. 900 is turned in and the
ratables should by any means increase so
that this sum could be obtained under the
limit set by law, of what weightswould be
the mere statement that $191, 600 was all
that was needed ? OF course no one will,
for minute, intimate that any such idea
was in the mind of the gentleman who
wrote the resolution but it can be easily
seen that if such an occurrence might
happen the board would have more
money to spend.