DENVILLE — The Republican candidates for governor attacked one another's plans for property tax reform at a debate hosted by a Morris County-based citizens' group on Thursday, five days before voters choose one of them as the GOP standard bearer.
Todd Caliguire and Steve Lonegan — both polling at less than 5 percent — said no plans other than their own will provide real property tax relief. They said their plans will cut state spending while the rest rely on state-sponsored givebacks.
"It makes very little sense for government to deliberately take taxes" to provide rebates, Caliguire, a former Bergen County freeholder, said. "It's our money, not the government's money."
Lonegan, the mayor of Bogota, said, "Trenton is not the answer to our problem, it is the problem."
Doug Forrester, who did not attend the debate at Denville's Riverview School, did not escape criticism. Caliguire said the 2002 U.S. Senate candidate has offered no specifics on how he would fund his promise to cut everyone's property tax bills by 30 percent in three years.
Forrester did not attend the debate because of a long-standing commitment to speak at a seniors' meeting in West Windsor, his hometown, his spokeswoman Sherry Sylvester said later. All the party's other candidates — Assemblyman Paul DiGaetano, Morris County Freeholder John Murphy, Washington Township Committeeman Robert Schroeder and Bret Schundler, the party's gubernatorial candidate in 2001 — attended the Thursday evening debate. The event, sponsored by a statewide grassroots group for property tax reform called The Silver Brigade, was moderated by Star-Ledger columnist Paul Mulshine and Daily Record columnist Fred Snowflack.
Caliguire said Schundler's plan, which would cap state spending by constitutional amendment and provide more state aid for local government, will allow for too much state control.
"Who's going to control all the public education? All the bureaucrats in the state," Caliguire said of Schundler's plan.
DiGaetano's property tax plan is similar to Schundler's, but calls for a more stringent cap on state spending. DiGaetano said Schundler's plan is "more liberal" than his. Schundler piped in to rebut, saying his plan would also control local government spending.
Both candidates said their plans would guarantee constrained state spending regardless of who controls the government because their spending caps would be written into the state constitution.
"Democrats aren't going to reduce your taxes ... you need the cap," DiGaetano said.
Schundler said his plan would eventually do away with property taxes.
"I don't think we need property taxes as a way to fund government," Schundler said.
Lonegan called eliminating property taxes a bad idea.
"I believe in property taxes, Bret, because I believe in local government," Lonegan said.
"As I stand up here, I think I'm in a Democratic convention, listening to these big government plans."
Murphy, who has specific plans to cut $750 million in what he calls wasteful state spending to provide for a 50 percent increase in property tax rebates, said such rebates help residents who receive them.
"A lot of what's going back to these seniors to keep them in their homes ... comes from other people," Murphy said. "It is actually redistribution."
"I'm glad you admit that," Lonegan rebutted.
Schroeder calls for using 75 percent of unanticipated state tax revenues to eliminate seniors' school property taxes over five years.
