Politics & Government

Brick's Tax Appeals Have Little Budget Impact

About $600K in taxes successfully appealed

Last year, Brick property owners appealed $35,115,150 in taxes. Of that amount, 598 appeals adding up to $653,142 in taxes – about $1,092 each – were granted by the Ocean County tax board.

Business Administrator Scott Pezarras said the township uses a reserve account set aside for uncollected tax revenue to minimize the budget impact of tax appeals. In all, he said, the $653,142 figure represents 31 one-hundreths of one percent of the township's $211 million budget.

"It sounds like a huge number, but in the grand scheme of things, it's not a huge number," Pezarras said. "As a reflective percentage, it's not so big."

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Some residents have called on township officials to set aside a separate reserve account just for tax appeals, but Pezarras said he has never seen a need to do so. The current method of using the uncollected taxes reserve, he said, has always worked fine.

Generally speaking, Pezarras said, the municipalities that set aside separate tax appeal reserve accounts are small towns that may have one massive ratable, such as a large factory, that contributes to a significant percentage – perhaps 10 percent or more – of the overall tax base.

Find out what's happening in Brickwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Since the amount of the appeals was within the threshhold budgeted for the current reserve account, residents' tax bills will not be revised to reflect the appeal amount, Pezarras said.

There are about 100 additional appeals currently filed in state tax court, Pezarras said, though those cases may not be decided for several years.


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