Dumont has seen some tremendous and long needed improvements to our local school sporting facilities and we need to recognize and appreciate the efforts of our Board of Ed members as well as our community at large for giving them the needed funding to make this all possible.
On the town side of the fence, that which our Mayor and Council are responsible for, we have seen very little of our tax dollars re-invested back into our community. Given the massive tax increases over the last 4 years, this should be a serious concern to everyone. Everyone should be asking why our local budget has gone from $13 MILLION TO $18 MILLION DOLLARS IN JUST 4 YEARS. Everyone should be asking where did $6 MILLION DOLLARS GO ?
Some improvements have been made to Memorial Park, but weren't these improvements really funded by Green Acres money? The project to address the flooding along sections that border the western section of New Milford Avenue is being funded by Infrastructure Trust money. Didn't Congressman Scott Garret present our town with a $1 Million check during a Memorial Day ceremony following funding requests by the prior administration?
While these steps are certainly commendable, have you noticed the diminishing aesthetic appearance of our town. Not all that long ago, Dumont was highlighted by New York Times as being an "Oasis in Bergen County". The article noted our community look, our great community programs and services and the high degree of desirability to live here, yet Dumont paid for all of it with taxes being the second lowest in all Bergen County. What many enjoyed as that Oasis has been allowed to deteriorate into a town with roads that are in need of repair, sidewalks that are crumbling, street signs falling to rust, weeds growing wild everywhere, public areas that have just become shoddy while taxes have escalated to one of the now highest in Bergen County.
One of the contributing problems is the fact that Dumont's historical practice of hiring residents as employees has become one of hiring and appointing out-of-towners. Employees who live in town care about their town and pay special attention to what needs to be done. When resident local employees are replaced by those that simply drive to and from their hometowns, the difference has been quite obvious and clearly shows. The attention to the details that make any town look good and clean has simply been forgotten or ignored. As an example, the new garbage and recycling pickup schedules developed by these out-of-towners leaves our neighborhoods with garbage cans, recycling containers and litter all over the place on any given day. Why didn't they just use the old schedule that scheduled garbage and recycling pickups on the same days?
Employee hiring and professional appointments have found their way to those who can donate the most money into political campaign coffers. Our current administration wants you to believe that they have hired qualified, professional personnel. Fact is, they have hired political associates from out of town and used our tax dollars to send them to school to get the required certifications.
Our town's current elected officials, who do the hiring and appointing, have among them those that do not share in our burden to pay property taxes. They have those among them that are driven by greed to enhance their own personal financial status and personal careers. We have also seen those among them that simply want to place family members on to our public payroll funded by our tax dollars.
Clearly, we are all seeing our taxes going through the roof. However, we have stopped seeing our tax dollars being reinvested back into the betterment of our community, but into the pockets of others who have no vested interest in our town.
Our local elected officials used any and all means possible to first get elected and have since relied on any untruth, gimmick or tactic to keep them in office. After all, they have a lot at stake, not only for themselves personally, but for the continued political success of their entire county political organization by "wheeling" political contributions from those that fuel their campaign war chests with our tax dollars.
The Democrats claim to have initiated a Shade Tree and Environmental Commission. Really? Fact is, Dumont has had this committee for over 10 years. Fact is, that big, red DPW Shade Tree Commission truck is 10 years old.
Even the new town website contains what they want you to believe has been more of their accomplishments. However, it is interesting to note the opening statement where it says "past, present and future projects". Many of those "past and present" where neither completed by the current administration nor was the funding for the projects acquired by any of them. In some cases, the project funding was received by the prior administration, but the Democrats delayed the projects to enable their appointed professionals to get some of the project dollars into their hands.
The following is from the new town website. The projects on the left are those that they want to take credit for, but, in reality, very little, if any, credit is due them at all.
| REPUBLICANS | DEMOCRATS |
| Brook Street parking lot repaved | Dixon Avenue repaved |
| Borough’s drug-free school zone mapping | Sunset Street repaved |
| Huntting Avenue repaved with sidewalks | Memorial Park improvements |
| McKinley Avenue repaved with sidewalks | Flooding Project along New Milford |
| Park Avenue repaved with sidewalks | |
| Roosevelt Avenue repaved with sidewalks |
