Meet the Candidates for Evesham Mayor and Council: Week 3
Every week, The Sun will ask candidates in the Nov. 4 election for council seats to respond to questions pertinent to local issues. Coverage for Week 2 here.
This week’s questions:
1.) What are some new ideas or approaches that you can bring to Town Council, and how will it benefit the town?
2.) How do you rate the current relationship between Council and the township school board? What, if anything, should change about the relationship, and how so?
Democratic Mayoral Candidate Fred Ritter, and Town Council Candidates Sophia Nowinski, and Phil Warren
1.) What are some new ideas or approaches that you can bring to Town Council, and how will it benefit the town?
As candidates for mayor and council, we are proposing numerous ideas and approaches that will benefit our town and residents.
There is a need for more transparency and accountability, which can be achieved through videotaping and public broadcasting of meetings to better inform residents.
We strongly believe that there is a need to conduct a complete independent audit of all township finances and processes to identify areas of potential savings for taxpayers and improve the way our town delivers services to every resident. For example, by utilizing low cost technologies, members of the council and administration could conduct telephone town halls to hear feedback directly from the residents when making decisions, or survey residents about their priorities through a public engagement program.
Along the same lines, the Township could utilize crowdsourcing platforms to leverage residents’ ideas and innovations, bringing ideas from the people up to the administration for potential discussion and implementation.
When we say this is our town, we believe the best way to move toward a better Evesham is to tap into our greatest asset: our residents.
We also believe regular office hours should be held to let residents voice their concerns, opinions and suggestions because all of these steps will help our town government harness the collective knowledge and expertise of its residents and begin thinking outside the box with new approaches to governance.
2.) How do you rate the current relationship between Council and the township school board? What, if anything, should change about the relationship, and how so?
We believe the council and mayor need to foster a working relationship based on trust and respect instead of an adversarial relationship to realize our town’s goals together.
Unfortunately, under this mayor and current administration, there has been far too much municipal interference in the workings of the township schools and politicization of issues surrounding the school board.
Members of the school board are independently elected by the residents to make decisions that are in the best interest of the students, and the township council and mayor should only be weighing in when financial matters come before them or opportunities for sharing services when beneficial.
However, we have seen an effort to influence decisions made by the school board that ultimately only serves to create controversy and distracts the school board from the main goals of educating our students and utilizing the resources provided by the taxpayers as efficiently and effectively as possible.
We would actively work to restore respect and restraint, working with the school board when mutually beneficial.
Republican Mayoral Candidate Mayor Randy Brown, and Town Council candidates Councilwoman Deborah Hackman, and Councilman Steven Zeuli
1.) What are some new ideas or approaches that you can bring to Town Council, and how will it benefit the town?
Let’s start with taxes and ratables. When the ratable base goes up, your taxes go down. We’re proud to announce that under the current town council, our ratable base for 2014 has increased $31 million. Simply put, our township’s residential and commercial values grew $31 million. Our Evesham Township council decreased property taxes in 2014 and grew the township surplus $4 million. When Mayor Brown was elected in 2007, our township was hemorrhaging a $6 million deficit. Now with smart business decisions and proper planning, we are sitting on a surplus of $4 million, a net turnaround of more than $10 million. We have fought through a glut of tax appeals, brutally cold and costly winters and arguably the worst economy in decades but have managed a $10 million net turnaround.
We will continue to create redevelopment zones; we have six redevelopment projects underway as of today. We will continue to promote smart growth that will bring hundreds of construction and permanent jobs to Evesham Township. We will continue streamlining government to decrease your municipal property taxes. We will grow our ratable base, build passive and active recreational sites and continue to work with Evesham Township entities and other municipalities on continuing shared service projects and agreements.
Evesham Township is the most efficient township in Burlington and Camden counties combined on a per capita base. How do we accomplish this year after year? Continued smart business decisions by our mayor, township council, township manager and our financial wing of Evesham Township.
Evesham Township was recently voted one of the most desirable places to live in New Jersey. Councilman Zeuli, Councilwoman Hackman and Mayor Brown commit to you that they will work everyday that they serve in office to be progressive and make Evesham the most desirable place to raise a family and live in the great state of New Jersey.
2.) How do you rate the current relationship between Council and the township school board? What, if anything, should change about the relationship, and how so?
Evesham Township has enjoyed a strong relationship with the Evesham Township School Board and administration, Evesham MUA, Lenape Regional High School District, Evesham Fire District, Marlton Rec Council, Marlton Business Association and the Evesham Celebrations Foundation.
Prior to 2008, Evesham Township operated in silos, and the above-mentioned entities not only didn’t communicate, they rarely did anything jointly. That has all changed.
The many shared services between the above-mentioned entities include: the School District Art Show at the township building, the highly successful Dare program run by the Evesham Police Department in all of the elementary schools, Fourth of July Fireworks at Cherokee High School, the MBA expo at the township’s Blue Barn and the joint gas pumps at the MUA station.
This council enjoys working with not only the Evesham Township School District, but all of the above-mentioned entities, and we look forward to continuing to foster deeper and stronger relationships, all for a better Marlton.
