The Sea Isle City Taxpayers Association made great strides during 2010 in helping to make Sea Isle a better place to live, own a business, and vacation. Our mission is to increase public awareness of key local issues and to advocate on behalf of Sea Isle’s taxpayers.

In 2010 we focused on several important issues of concern to our community and communicated these through the media, our own newsletter, as well as at City Council meetings. Our overarching principle is that our tax dollars should be collected equitably (in line with usage and not favoring one group over others) and spent prudently. In 2010, SICTA showed that the City did not live up to this principle:

• Although the City negotiated new contracts with its employee unions in 2010, many of the supposed savings were illusory as raises will compound to 19% over the five years of the contracts. This is far short of the recommendations that SICTA advocated which would have decreased salary and benefit costs by 12% over the next three years. When is the City administration going to end the “gravy train”?

• The current sewer and water rate structure overemphasizes fixed charges versus variable charges that would more equitably distribute costs in line with usage and promote water conservation. In Sea Isle the small user (30,000 gallons annually) pays 10 times as much per 1,000 gallons as the large user (1,500,000 gallons annually), while in contrast in the other shore communities the charge per gallon for large and small users are virtually identical. Why can’t Sea Isle come up with a fairer system?

• The number of rental permits issued in Sea Isle City decreased 6 percent last year, according to a SICTA study of public records. Since 2006 The City has seen a drop of roughly 300 permits. At $125 per permit, this could be as much as $37,000 in lost revenues. What is this attributable to? Our analysis points the finger squarely at poor compliance with and enforcement of permitting. Sea Isle now has fewer permits than any time since 1999. It is time for the current administration to again redouble its permitting efforts!

• Whenever a city charges fees for a service, one of its responsibilities is to properly determine and assign the costs for that service. The allocations of employee costs to water & sewer vis-à-vis beach, marina and other services show this is not true. Water and sewer receive too high a percentage of the allocated expenses, while the City is ultra conservative in cost allocations to the beach and marina. Wouldn’t it be more equitable to relieve the taxpayers’ burden by raising beach tag fees (fees in Avalon, Stone Harbor, Cape May and Cape May Point are 20-33% higher than ours)?

During 2010, SICTA conducted its 4th annual survey, this time jointly sponsored by the Chamber of Commerce and Sea Isle Revitalization. The response rate was an all time high. Our survey showed people’s satisfaction with the Public Works Department and Sea Isle’s promotion of business development.

On the other hand there was displeasure with the roads and storm water runoff (it appears the City is more aggressively addressing these issues with the projects planned for 2011), the return on tax dollars, and the way the water and sewer rates are structured (see above). The respondents wanted SICTA to concentrate on future efforts on city spending, non-resident voting rights, water and sewer taxes, and parking—we will do so!

As a testament to our efforts, we attracted a record number of new members, an increase of 17% over last year.
Lastly, we would like to announce three new SICTA appointments:

• Joe McDevitt is taking over for Gary Egnasko as President of SICTA (Gary will continue to serve on SICTA’s Board). Joe is a graduate of Villanova University and has been a CPA since 1970. His career included the positions of Senior Audit Manager for a Big 8 accounting firm, Vice President and Controller of the financial subsidiary of a major maker of heavy duty trucks, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of a $3.5 billion commercial finance company, and co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of an automobile loan company.

• Seymour Burchman and Kevin Cornely were elected as new Board members. Seymour obtained his BS in Chemical Engineering from Cornell University and his Masters in Public Administration from Carnegie-Mellon University. Seymour has over 25 years of experience as a management consultant serving many Fortune 500 companies.

His record of public service included a stint with the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue as a Special Assistant to the Secretary and head of the Philadelphia District Office. Kevin is a graduate of Saint Francis University (Loretto, PA) Kevin has over 30 years of recruitment and staffing management experience with several Fortune 500 companies. Most recently he has served as the Senior Director, Global Recruiting and Staffing for a major pharmaceutical company. Kevin and his wife have been Sea Isle City homeowners for over 10 years.