October 5, 2023
Talk Is Cheap. Running a Township Is Hard.
by Hal Wright

I like living in Newtown Township. I've been here since 2006, after moving from neighboring Northampton Township, where I lived for 21 years.

Things have changed here over the years. There are more houses, more businesses, more people, more cars. We've become less rural and more suburban, it's true. Some of us mourn the loss of open space and uncrowded roads. Some of us wish our municipal government could take control and turn back the clock.

Our conservative neighbors who claim to believe in a free, private economy and in limited government interference are often the first to complain that municipal governments aren't bringing private developers to heel. Apparently, their faith in laissez-faire capitalism applies only to territory outside their township or borough's border. For such folks, NIMBY-ism carries with it a measure of cognitive dissonance.

In reality, our economy in the United States is mostly private, and it will stay that way. Developers have a right to buy land and to do with it what they wish, within constraints imposed by local zoning ordinances and regulations. They have a right to sue municipalities when the variances they've requested are denied. For municipalities, such fights are time-consuming and expensive in their own right. Worse, the legal battle could be lost, in which case the money spent on legal fees is lost to taxpayers with no benefit accrued.

Some of our neighbors want robust legal defense of the status quo while also opposing tax increases to pay for it. More cognitive dissonance.

Add to the mix the positive aspects of development. More restaurants with good food to enjoy. More shopping right around the corner. Greater small business opportunities. More jobs. Some of our neighbors appreciate the advantages of a developed township and don't understand the fuss.

All of this is to say that municipal governance is hard. A board of supervisors serves many masters with differing opinions on what success looks like. And, we all want to have our cake and eat it too. We want a strong police presence to keep us safe without being taxed to pay for it. We want beautifully paved roads without being taxed to pay for them. And so on.

When candidates opposing an incumbent board of supervisors decry the present trajectory of change in a community while also promising to impose better fiscal discipline, improve public safety, and curb development all at once, alarms should sound. When such promises are not accompanied by specifics, the alarms should become louder.

The present Newtown Township Board of Supervisors inherited a financial crisis from the previous board. Problems requiring urgent attention were piling up without the means to resolve them. So yes, taxes were raised, to preserve the solvency of our municipality and the public services upon which we all rely. Making these hard choices, deferred for many years while the other party was in charge, is what the board members were elected to do.

Four things about our municipal taxes opponents of the current board don't want you to know:

(1) Our tax rates are still low, in the bottom 1/3 of municipalities in Bucks County,

(2) Some of the increase in taxes occurred to pay for emergency services approved in a referendum,

(3) The amount most of us pay is modest, just a few hundred dollars per year, and

(4) Among other things, the tax increase enabled us to give our police what they said they needed to keep us safe.

The bulk of our real estate tax bill consists of school taxes (79% in 2023), with county taxes (15%) and township taxes (6%) making up the remainder (source). Two-thirds of the municipalities in Bucks County pay more, in some cases five times more. In absolute dollars, anyone in a community with HOA dues is paying their HOA many times what they pay their township. It feels to me as though we are getting our money's worth in Newtown Township.