State awards Hazlet small token in aid By elaine van develde Staff Writer HAZLET — They held out for any little bit of state aid they could get, and a little bit is what they got. Hazlet officials were informed last week that they received $25,000 in extraordinary state aid. They were hoping for more so they could cut taxpayers’ burden a bit, but they’ll take what they were given, officials said. Now, after waiting for months, the Township Committee will adopt the 2003 budget with slightly less than the anticipated 4.9-cent increase. "We can’t say that it wasn’t worth it to hold out for any little bit of state aid we can get. Now our tax increase will only be something like a 4.75-cent increase instead of 4.9 cents. It’s definitely something," Deputy Mayor Christopher Cullen said. "Hey, we’re happy to have it. We don’t know what we’ll put it toward yet, but it will be a help." The township applied for $400,000 in aid to help defray the cost for emergencies such as the 2002 blizzard snow removal and curtailed costs from privatized fleet maintenance. If municipalities adopt their budgets before knowing what the state aid figures are, the money cannot be included when it comes through. So Hazlet and a few other municipalities waited to adopt their budgets. Now that the state funds are accounted for, "we’ll probably call a special meeting and adopt [the budget] soon," Cullen said. Hazlet’s next committee meeting is scheduled for Aug. 5. The summer schedule includes only one meeting a month. The public hearing on the budget has already taken place. Whittled down from an initial municipal tax hike of 9 cents per $100 of assessed property valuation, the increase went down to 7.5 cents and was introduced in March at 4.9 cents. Right now the $13.6 million municipal budget calls for $7.2 million to be raised through taxation. It translates into property owners paying 67.9 cents per $100 of assessed valuation, up 4.9 cents from 63 cents per $100 last year. The total budget of 2002 was $12.8 million, and increased this year by $725,000. Calling the increase a testament to tightening the township’s spending belt, Mayor Steven Piech blamed the bulk of the hike on costly employee insurance premiums and personnel contractual obligations. The 2003 snowstorms also buried the township in removal costs, he said. Officials thought that they’d get most or all of the state aid they asked for because they had instituted long-term cost saving initiatives such as interlocal and shared service agreements with other towns, the Board of Education and the fire district. Such efforts, administrator Margaret Margiotta has said, "provide an incentive that should be rewarded by the aid." Under the proposed 2003 budget, only $120,000 is left in the township’s surplus fund. This year $1.4 million was drained from the account, and last year $1.3 million in surplus was used.