I recently met with high school student leaders in Jersey City Public Schools who are sharing stories of the conditions inside their schools. They go by the name “Revolutionizers of Jersey City High Schools” (r.o.j.c.h.s.) and have an Instagram channel here. Their pictures and videos give a glimpse of what they are experiencing on a daily basis, which includes a bathroom sink sitting on the floor (detached from the wall), crumbling ceilings, ceilings with exposed ducts and wiring, classrooms disrupted by mice and roaches, and more. They had been interested in learning about the budget so I was happy to ...
This is part of a series about local budgets and property tax. View the series landing page here. I am sharing in this post a tool I’ve been using (and will continue to use) as I write this series. It is a property tax dashboard, created from a fantastic set of datasets published by the NJ Department of Community Affairs (that site is here). Each year, the state collects prior year property tax data and published them in standalone Excel files. I’ve been compiling the data year on year and now have all of them in Tableau. In 2019 I ...
This is part of a series about local budgets and property tax. View the series landing page here. I am launching a new series on CivicParent about the local government budget process and property tax. My hope is for this series to be: A practical roadmap for taxpayers who may want to engage the 2023 local budget cycle in their community. Primarily targeted at taxpayers who are relatively new to the realm of property tax and the local budget process. A space to share public data that informs the property tax landscape in municipalities throughout NJ. A space to share ...
This post made my head spin a bit … the math and timing is wonky and confusing. I’ve done my best to break it down and welcome dialog and feedback about anything that is unclear. This past week, Jersey City’s municipal council passed its annual 2022 budget with a $112 million increase to the city levy. This action caps a year of change in Jersey City’s property tax landscape; school tax and city tax have both increased. Residents will see these increases in their tax bills, but what can make this somewhat confusing is that the rates are not approved ...
I’ve often received the question: how does our town’s property tax compare to the state average? Using the most recently available 2021 statewide data (from the Division of Local Government Services here), I put that visual together below. When viewing the visual, it’s important to note: This visual shows property tax for 3 local governments — Schools, Municipality (aka Town or City), and County. Property tax is one of, and often the biggest, revenue for a local government budget. In terms of what this revenue pays for (another common question): I’ve primarily analyzed school and municipal budgets on CivicParent. One ...
I wanted to share some thoughts around the $89 million "maintenance of equity" funds that Jersey City Public Schools received this week. The quick highlight, if I could make one, is: yes, this $89 million is indeed a windfall...but we are still facing a fiscal cliff and we all have to be aware of that cliff now, not six months from now when the BOE is debating its next budget. I want to, in this post, aim to put the "maintenance of equity" funding into context with the broader paradigm of "S2" state aid cuts still playing out in Jersey ...
This is part of a series about the 2022 Jersey City budget. To see the full series, click here. For a listing of public data used in this post, please see the bottom of the post. Many thanks to those in community who gave feedback about this topic/post and helped improve it from concept to published post. Midway through the year, property tax bills are being adjusted for new local tax rates and questions arise, including: What might the new total tax expense be in 2022, based on 2022 local government budgets? What is the new breakout of school versus ...
In this post I’m using 2 public datasets: A: Jersey City’s 2022 Municipal Budget (Introduced) with proposed 2022 revenue and expense, located on the city website here. B: Jersey City’s 2015-2021 Municipal Budget summaries compiled in NJ’s User Friendly Budget Database (Excel file downloadable here). On June 15th, Jersey City released introduced its 2022 budget. I’ve reviewed that budget in tandem with historic budget data contained within NJ’s User Friendly Budget Database and wanted to share some key insights around revenues. I will point readers back to my previous post regarding structural expense, because it ties into three key insights ...
On June 15th, Jersey City released introduced its 2022 budget. This is a part of a series about that budget. In this post I’m using three public datasets: A: Jersey City’s 2022 Municipal Budget (Introduced) with proposed 2022 revenue and expense, located on the city website here. B: Jersey City’s 2015-2021 Municipal Budget summaries compiled in NJ’s User Friendly Budget Database (Excel file downloadable here). In my last post, I shared a big picture of the budget. In this post, I want to focus on some nuance around expense because expense gets at the services we all care about, and ...
On June 15th, Jersey City released introduced its 2022 budget. This is a part of a series about that budget. In this post I’m using two public datasets: A: Jersey City’s 2022 Municipal Budget (Introduced) with proposed 2022 revenue and expense, located on the city website here. B: Jersey City’s 2015-2021 Municipal Budget summaries compiled in NJ’s User Friendly Budget Database (Excel file downloadable here). Jersey City’s 2022 budget, as introduced in June, increased by $43 million over 2021’s final approved budget. As we dive into the budget details, we see nuance emerge that points to two major trends: Structural ...
The Jersey City municipal budget was introduced last week (June 15th) via resolution 22-4009. For the past three years, I've dug into the municipal budget to better understand it. I write about it and share insights and analysis as I proceed; this year will be the fourth cycle and this year I'm adding some live teach-ins to the mix. My first teach-in is June 27th at 7pm at Saint Peter's University. My main focus on June 27th will be the "user friendly budget." For now, I wanted to focus on the other budget document - the standard budget that is ...
Tonight the Jersey City Board of Education passed its 2022-23 school budget along a 5-4 vote, approving funds that staved off staff layoffs in the face of historic state aid cuts. The passing of this budget will create ripple effects on the city and county budgeting processes (the city and county have yet to reveal their calendar-year budgets). More to come on CivicParent as that unfolds. For now, I wanted to credit the BOE trustees who voted for this budget: Lorenzo Richardson Gina Verdibello Noemi Velazquez Gerald Lyons Paula Jones-Watson This may not have been a popular vote but in my ...
The Jersey City Board of Education increased the school tax levy...now what? I'm getting that question from more than a few people so I figured I'd share two tools: A school tax calculator - view an estimate of how your school tax expense will increase in 2022 A 2021 property tax split -- personalized for your home's assessed value, to put the school tax increase in perspective for the coming year A disclaimer: these are general teaching tools only, created to help illustrate the math at work and give a lens that is somewhat personalized. If you wish to understand ...
This is my final post re: the Jersey City Public Schools budget which will be voted on this Monday. The 2022-23 budget is far from certain to pass; anti-school-tax rhetoric may reduce funding so let's be honest about what that means: possible staff reductions or vacancies that won't be filled. And possibly more. A few related points, and information from my website to help inform the perspective: 1) This budget is majority staffing, so cuts to funding could result in cuts to staffing. I recall in 2019 seeing similar paradigm (need to fund but BOE chose not to fund w/ ...
This is an update on the unfolding budget process for Jersey City Public Schools; the budget was introduced Tuesday March 15th and will be finalized on or before next Monday, March 21st. I watched Tuesday’s board of education meeting and then reviewed the budget document on my own, trying to make sense of the numbers presented, including creating some graphs. I figured I’d share what I learned along with next steps advocacy for those who may be interested. 1-The needs. As Dr. Fernandez outlined on Monday night, the programs outlined starting on page 34 of the budget document includes (but ...
I was curious about Jersey City’s budgetary trends and so created a few high level visuals that I am sharing on CivicParent in case others were interested in understanding these documents in real-time, i.e. relevant to the current budget process in 2023. I wrote a series about the “user friendly” budget in 2020 if you need a primer on this budget form. The municipal budget is hyper detailed but when we summarize it we can ...
I dug into Jersey City’s municipal budget (as introduced on May 10th) and wanted to share a visual that I am using to better understand the budget. The one big constraint I find with Jersey City’s budget is that it is “locked” in PDF; I’m a visual thinker so I prefer to view data through pictures. Some initial insights: The 2023 budget is mostly “people cost” (salaries & benefits) driven primarily by public safety (police, ...
This is part of a 2023 series about property tax in NJ. View the series landing page here. An upfront caveat: the levy is a topic with vast scope beyond what I can and want to cover here. There is a lot more you can reference; for instance, a good read if you have the time and interest is “A Short History of the Property Tax & the Long Road to Reform” from the NJ ...
This is part of a series about local budgets and property tax. View the series landing page here. New Jersey has 21 county tax boards and I’ve got links to their websites below (links are current as of the writing of this post). Click on a county to see the related information including the county board of taxation websites. These links are current as of March 2023 and are of course subject to change. Atlantic County ...
Location update for the March 26th 2pm Property Tax Appeals Workshop: I'm excited to share my first workshop which will happen tomorrow, Sunday March 26th at 2pm in SPU's McIntyre Hall located on JFK Boulevard between Montgomery and Glenwood, which I've mapped below. The deadline for property tax appeals is rapidly approaching in Hudson County (and many other counties, too). To help community members engage the nuance, I will be co-hosting this property tax appeals workshop ...
This is part of a series about local budgets and property tax. View the series landing page here. In my previous post I touched upon “implied” market value. In this post I want to touch upon NJ’s “Chapter 123” law which I last wrote about in , but am revisiting again with an interactive teaching visualization in Tableau. Chapter 123 Law is not terribly complicated once you’ve gathered the requisite data, which is a combination ...
This is part of a series about local budgets and property tax. View the series landing page here. In advance of my upcoming property tax appeals workshop on March 26th, I’ve been thinking about how to distill property tax appeals math in the most intuitive way possible. And in my view, “implied” market value is an intuitive lens. A taxpayer is supposed to be taxed according to “true” value. Yet the tax bill contains “assessed” ...
This is part of a series about local budgets and property tax. View the series landing page here. The tax bill offers a highly personalized context to connect our property (the basis of our property tax) with the larger system of property taxation in the community (which involves the levy, the tax base, and the resulting tax rates). But the tax bill is not entirely transparent as to: determining if the assessed value in your ...
This is part of a series about local budgets and property tax. View the series landing page here. To follow the public money and better understand what’s driving your property tax bills, you have to know when to engage the process. Understanding the “when” can take a taxpayer into a series of bureaucratic rabbit holes (I’ve heard this feedback from others and I’ve also experienced it myself), so I want to disclaim upfront: this post ...
This is part of a series about local budgets and property tax. View the series landing page here. Throughout this series I am using resources and links from a variety of sources. I’m sharing as I go and will update this page as the series progresses. Helpful initial resources: NEW JERSEY HOMEOWNER’S GUIDE TO PROPERTY TAXES TOOLKIT. This is “a comprehensive resource answering homeowners’ everyday questions about how their home’s value is assessed, how their property ...
This post made my head spin a bit … the math and timing is wonky and confusing. I’ve done my best to break it down and welcome dialog and feedback about anything that is unclear. This past week, Jersey City’s municipal council passed its annual 2022 budget with a $112 million increase to the city levy. This action caps a year of change in Jersey City’s property tax landscape; school tax and city tax have ...
Let’s take a look at how a tax bill comes together. It’s an interesting and empowering exercise to tie your local government budgets – and the property taxes needed to fund them – to your personal property tax. Every year, the state publishes town-by-town property tax data here that includes a wealth of information including tax base value, property taxes used to fund local budgets, and the average assessed home value in each town. The ...
On January 26th, 2022 I joined Montclair Councilor-at-large Peter Yacobellis for a zoom webinar about the Montclair municipal (aka town) budget. My portion of the webinar was a teaching about how to engage the public budget file, which is large, complex, but ultimately a primary source for understanding how the local government both collects and spends public monies. My sincerest thanks to Councilor Yacobellis and Montclair residents Eileen Birmingham, Nolan Haims, and Colleen Dougherty for inviting ...
For the past few months I’ve been working with a fantastic group of advocates in Montclair to learn more about their city budget. The visual below is an outgrowth of our work. Through dialog, teaming, and learning together, these views helped us better understand revenue and expense trends within the budget. Some of these visuals will be used in the Jan 26th webinar so I wanted to make them available here on CivicParent for those ...
This is an update to my “User Friendly Budget” series with a focus on Montclair. Your town’s user friendly budget must be posted on your town’s website (per state law here). The 5th page of the user friendly budget (“UFB-5”) provides a detailed view of your town’s tax base. This is a very informing lens into your property tax bill because the tax bill helps determine the tax rate: Property Tax Revenue ($) needed to ...
This is part of a series on the 2021 city budget. The spirit of this series is: I’m interested in unpacking the budget and sharing as I go. In that same spirit, I’m sharing interactive Tableau data visualizations that help others dig into the budget. See the full serieshere. The 2021 budget documents are onlinehere. One question I’ve gotten around the city budget is: “how much tax money goes to abatements each year?” We can answer this using public data. In this post, I want to look at this and other abatement-related insights we can glean from the 2021 user ...
This is post included in both my abatement series and a series about the User Friendly Budget in NJ. We need better disclosures in NJ to understand the impact of tax abatements on the local fiscal landscape, particularly as it relates to public schools. The user friendly budget – mandated by the state starting in 2015 – was a welcome and needed first step to increase transparency, but more is needed and local governments can shore up the gap if they choose to. We can explore this using Jersey City’s abatement data. User Friendly Budget Abatement Data Currently, the detailed ...
Note: the visualizations below are best viewed on a computer or tablet (vs a phone). Jersey City recently announced it was terminating an abatement on four buildings within the Beacon complex. The reason: “ownership defaulted on an obligation to retain and present employee records, city officials announced.” This is a good reminder that abatements are contracts, and there are terms within each that require compliance. In light of this update, I thought it would be interesting to share another post from my “User Friendly Budget” series: the “UFB-6 Tax Abatements” tab. This post is part of my “User Friendly Budget” ...
This is part of a series about the 2019/20 proposed municipal and schools budgets in Jersey City. Jersey City’s proposed 2019/20 municipal budget shows that over $120 million in PILOT fees are expected to be collected in in the coming year. What is notable about PILOT fees is that they don’t contribute to the school tax. I wrote about abatements, PILOT fees, and the detrimental impact on the public schools back in 2015, but to quickly recap how it works: the City Council grants an abatement to a developer, who then constructs a building. Then, rather than the building paying ...
Jersey City Together Tax Appeal Workshop. In March 2017 I worked with a team of Jersey City Together leaders to provide a tax appeals workshop. We invited homeowners to meet with us to determine if their homes were over-assessed which, in turn, helped us determine if they were over-taxed. It was a cooperative civic action involving many volunteers…over 100 homeowners registered and nearly that many showed up and waited in line to participate in the workshop (see JC Together’s Facebook status below for pictures from the workshop). A team of us with Jersey City Together then analyzed the data, helped prep ...
I’m sharing a new map I created that pin-drops all abatements approved since Mayor Fulop and the current City Council took office*, i.e. since the summer of 2013. I created the map after reading Terrence McDonald‘s recent article from the Jersey Journal titled “Has Steve Fulop Evolved on Tax Abatements?” It’s a valid question and a great article, I highly recommend reading it if you haven’t already. I thought an abatement map would help supplement an understanding of this topic. I took city abatement data and layered in additional data of my own (e.g. council votes, wards) that allow for ...
I teamed up with Ellen Simon to co-author an op-ed in The Jersey Journal about how Jersey City’s PILOT policy harms our public schools. The article is dense with facts, figures, and assertions. To ensure our assertions are as accessible as possible to the public, I’ve created a landing page to help readers sort through the substantiation and the logic. Quotes from The Jersey Journal op-ed article are in large, blue font. Our substantiation, including links to source documents, follows. Admittedly, the text below is also, necessarily, a bit dense with facts and figures. But the goal is to provide greater ...
I teamed up with Ellen Simon, a friend, fellow public school parent, and former board trustee of the Jersey City BOE, to co-author an op-ed in the Jersey Journal. The topic: how Jersey City’s PILOT policy “robs” funding from our public schools. The term “rob” is not ours…to find out who did coin the term, in context of Jersey City’s PILOT schemes, read the article! You can find the op-ed here ...
If you are new to the topic of abatements, I recommend my tax abatement series here. I’ve updated my 2015 long-term abatement map to include 2016 data. The map is provided below, along with reports showing underlying data grouped by project type (affordable housing vs. market) and by ward. Source data was derived from the city’s user friendly budgets and abatement documents from the tax office. These are all abatements currently paying “PILOT” fees into the respective year’s budget. Key Insights The city increased the number of abatements from 146 in 2015 to 168 in 2016 (an 8% increase in abatement contracts). As a result, PILOT ...
A strong public school system is essential bedrock to a healthy community. Yet in Jersey City, our bedrock is threatened by a fiscal policy that is over-reliant on PILOTs. Here’s the crux of the problem: PILOTs help grow the city, which in turn increases demand for public schools. But PILOTed residents don’t pay school tax, leaving taxpayers to bear the burden of increased school cost. Two factors compound this problem: (1) the city is now dependent on PILOTs to fund itself, so there is economic and political pressure to maintain the current course instead of fixing this structural problem before it grows even worse and (2) state education aid ...
As I explained in my last post, transparency around abatements is finally, slowly, increasing. As data is unlocked, taxpayers can glean greater insight into how their tax dollars are spent. To help with this effort, I’ve mapped the 146 abatements from Jersey City’s 2015 “user friendly budget” into an easy-to-use Google map. Let’s Get Civic with #OpenData In the coming weeks I’ll be writing more about these abatements and what this data can tell us. But I’d love others to also dive into the data, using the visual as an aid, to learn more about specific areas of interest, be it affordable ...
Tax abatement reporting in Jersey City is finally getting more transparent. Two distinct authoritative bodies have mandated changes that require Jersey City (and other cities) to get onboard the transparency train. This news should come as a relief to taxpayers since abatements now constitute over 20% of Jersey City’s annual revenue yet have been sharply criticized by the NJ Comptroller as being too opaque and a detriment to both the county and the local schools. The new transparency impacts two documents that are of import to taxpayers: The budget: a forward-looking estimate of how the government expects to spend taxpayer money in the current year. The financial statements: a backward-looking set of statements that detail how the government ...
Jersey City has been estimating the cost of its abatements incorrectly for at least eight years, and the impact to conventional taxpayers could amount to millions of dollars. Here’s the problem: Jersey City has been under-counting the number of (a) residents and (b) public school students that will eventually live in each abated building. The City has been using demographic estimates from the early 1990s instead of updating its estimates – as it should have done – in 2006 when a new demographic report was published by Rutgers University’s Bloustein School of Planning & Public Policy (“the Bloustein School”). [The Bloustein School has not updated its ...
In my Abatement Series, I’ve discussed the basic premise of abatements, how they are funded, and the impact to conventional taxpayers. In this post I look at Mayor Fulop’s new tax abatement policy for Jersey City, which includes two notable components: Tiering System: A system of awarding abatements based on geographic location or project type1. Each “tier” equates to a baseline abatement length (e.g. Tier 1 = 5 years, Tier 2 = 10 years, etc). PreK Facilities & the “Buy-Up”: a mechanism by which a developer can “buy-up” to a higher tier, and thereby extend an abatement term. The premise of the ...
In his 2010 report, “A Programmatic Examination of Tax Abatements,” NJ Comptroller A. Matthew Boxer highlighted numerous weaknesses with abatements. One issue he touched upon was transparency. He stated, “Information concerning abatement[s]…is not published in a transparent manner or centralized location, making it difficult to impossible for the public to compare, calculate the effect of, or be fully aware of those agreements.” (See page1 of the link.) The Transparency Scale The Comptroller’s assertion invites us to ask: with respect to tax abatements, what level of transparency should we expect from our local government? Consider this question along a scale with ...
This post is meant to help a taxpayer get a jump-start on determining: is my property over-assessed? This post is not intended to cover all nuance that may arise for a particular taxpayer. Nuance abounds, which is why I’ve provided links to the state rules and public data. If you are a homeowner than you likely recently received your assessment postcard. On the back of the postcard are “Appeal Instructions” and taxpayers are asked “if you agree with the assessed value shown, you do not need to do anything.” But…if you disagree with the assessed value, you can appeal, leading ...
For the past 4 years I’ve been researching and writing about property taxes and revaluation (among other topics) on CivicParent. In the past year I’ve also written about tax appeals and I also served on a team of Jersey City Together volunteers in 2017 that helped over 30 residents save over $40,000 in tax expense through successful appeals. On June 5th I hosted a tax appeals workshop at New Hope Missionary Baptist Church to explain revaluation and go over the appeals process. You can download my presentation here. I’ve also created this post as a summary. I hope it’s helpful ...
I received my new tax postcard in the mail yesterday so I figured I’d share a breakdown of how to read it. This is very similar to the former tax post card, with some notable exceptions: You can now see your NEW tax assessed value. This is the value assigned to your property by Appraisal Systems (the 3rd party firm conducting the Reval). The value you see on your tax postcard means this is the value now officially on file with the tax office of Jersey City. The appeal deadline is June 18, 2018. If you do not appeal by ...
I've got another Revaluation update, this one focused on Neptune Avenue which is an East/West street that stretches pretty much across Jersey City's south Greenville neighborhood. Similar to other Greenville Revaluation-related updates, this is a story of systemic overtaxation that is being fixed with Revaluation. First, some high level details about the data. Appraisal Systems' most recent assessment file is from March 23, 2018 and there are 206 properties on Neptune Ave. in this dataset. Of the 206 properties: Total net change in tax expense: - $511,773. 202 properties will see property tax expense DECREASES 4 properties will see property ...
Country Village / Our Lady of Mercy Revaluation Update: $3 million tax expense reduction (and counting...) for selected blocks March 18 2018. Appraisal Systems released a new batch of assessments on March 16th - the same day Jersey City's public school teachers went on strike. So...this latest update wasn't covered in the news. It should be though; finally, Country Village homes are listed. Per estimates released by Jersey City in December 2017, Country Village is expected to see the largest dollar-for-dollar tax expense decreases when the 2018 property revaluation is completed. This means we can finally get some home-by-home insight into the Revaluation-impact of the most ...
February 27, 2018. Appraisal Systems released a new batch of assessments this morning and I was most curious about tax change in systemically over-taxed areas. I was hoping streets in Country Village would be listed because, per estimates released by Jersey City in December 2017, Country Village is expected to see the largest dollar-for-dollar tax expense decreases when the 2018 property revaluation is completed. Also, I recently gave a property tax workshop at Our Lady of Mercy Church, located in the Country Village area and I am hoping to follow-up with those attendees re: tax expense change. Country Village was ...
Understanding the Tax Rate that Drives Your Property Tax Expense General Tax Rate = Total Levy / Tax Base. February 25, 2018. I got a question recently about the tax rate as it relates to property taxes. It prompted me to write about the tax rate in a bit more detail to explain how the tax rate is changing, why it's changing, and what to expect in the coming months as the Revaluation unfolds. The NJ Division of Taxation explains the tax rate here and they show how the tax rate is used to compute your tax bill: But how is ...
Updated: Feb 19, 2018. Appraisal Systems today published on its website an updated assessments file with about 1,950 new properties added (note: I won’t be updating this page with every single new release from Appraisal Systems…but I have a property tax workshop tonight at Our Lady of Mercy Church and I wanted to be equipped with latest/greatest data and happened to notice new data). Most background and context I shared yesterday (per post below) still stands. But, some new info I’m now observing: The “VCS” field in Appraisal Systems’ data does, as I noted yesterday, define geographic areas within Jersey ...
Learn how to compute if your property tax expense will go up or down in a citywide revaluation. It’s helpful to have a calculator, pen, and paper on hand while watching this video ...
Learn the basics about property revaluation in this 8-minute CivicParent tutorial: ...
This post is part of my effort to share information about Jersey City’s Property Revaluation. I wrote a Revaluation series last year which you can read here. In a citywide revaluation, your new assessment should equal your market value. When establishing market value of your home, one set of data that can be useful is recent, comparable, usable home sales, where: Recent is a sale that’s occurred within the past 1-3 years, thus still has time-based relevance about market value. Usable, generally speaking, is a 3rd party sale. Technically speaking, a sale not otherwise coded by NJ state law as a non-usable ...
Figure out your ASSESSED value ASSESSED Value = Your home’s value according to the GOVERNMENT. Your assessed value is what the city thinks your property is worth for property taxation purposes. It is the basis on which your tax bill is computed each year: Your Annual Tax Expense = Assessed Value x Tax Rate Assessed value is part of your tax record, which is on file with the city, county, and state … and accessible online HERE. I have a sample tax record pictured below. Note that assessed value is the sum-total of 2 components: Land Value PLUS Building Value (the “building” ...
Jersey City property taxes, as seen through state compliance data: Jersey City’s last citywide revaluation was in 1988. Jersey City’s 2017 equalization ratio is 23.66%. Jersey City’s 2017 coefficient of deviation is 35.66%. On this map: Green = under-taxed | Red = over-taxed NJ property tax law is based on this foundational premise: assessed values are supposed to equal market values. Put another way: your tax bill is supposed to be based on the market value of your home. The state tracks how compliant a city is with this premise with something called an “Assessment-Sales Ratio” which is defined as: Assessed Value / ...
WHO conducted Jersey City’s property revaluation? In 2016 Jersey City hired Appraisal Systems, Inc. for $4.4 million to conduct the revaluation. Here are some helpful links about the firm: ASI’s website page for Jersey City residents here. ASI’s generic powerpoint that explains the Revaluation process is here. This is an excellent overview of the general process. ASI provided Ward-specific overviews of the Revaluation in the spring of 2017. I attended the Ward “A” meeting and summarized the meeting in a CivicParent post here. Per this NJ State Legislature report, in 2005 there were only 12 firms statewide that conducted citywide revaluations, and ...
Jersey City Together Tax Appeal Workshop. In March 2017 I worked with a team of Jersey City Together leaders to provide a tax appeals workshop. We invited homeowners to meet with us to determine if their homes were over-assessed which, in turn, helped us determine if they were over-taxed. It was a cooperative civic action involving many volunteers…over 100 homeowners registered and nearly that many showed up and waited in line to participate in the workshop (see JC Together’s Facebook status below for pictures from the workshop). A team of us with Jersey City Together then analyzed the data, helped prep ...