Trustees vote in favor of taking stipend

The South Orange Board of Trustees has voted in favor of giving its members a stipend and changing when local elections are held.

The changes were in an ordinance that would amend the township charter if approved by the state. It will now be submited to the state legislature asking for the adoption of a special law to authorize amending the village’s charter, setting the stage for tweaks and additions to South Orange’s first charter written in 1904.

The ordinance passed on Aug. 14 with a vote of 5-1; Trustee Karen Hartshorn Hilton cast the opposing vote.

Town charters require a review every 12 years. South Orange’s charter was last amended in 1977. In 2009, the BOT created a Charter Review Committee which made recommendations for an amended charter, but the state legislature did not enact it.

The 2023 ordinance proposes several changes to South Orange’s charter. One of them would change the name of the town from “Township of South Orange Village” to “South Orange Village.” According to Trustee Summer Jones, “Township of South Orange Village” was adopted in 1977 to apply for federal funding that is no longer needed, so the official name is now no longer needed.

Several other names would change as well, including the titles of elected officials. The governing body would be changed from “Board of Trustees” to “Council.” The title of “Village President” would become “Mayor” and “Trustee” would become “Council Member.” One unelected official title would change as well: “Village Treasurer” would become “Chief Financial Officer.”

The amended charter would also allow for November local elections; South Orange currently holds its village president and Board of Trustee elections in May every two years.

The change, according to Jones, is intended to raise voter turnout. Though New Jersey currently does not employ ranked choice voting, the amended charter would allow South Orange to use the election method if the state does introduce it in the future.

The amendment would also eliminate the sole use of male pronouns.

The final element of the amended charter would establish stipends for elected officials: $12,000 a year for the mayor and $8,000 a year for members of the council. No elected official would be entitled to a pension or healthcare because of the stipend. This has been a sticking point in the past with potential charter amendments, according to Jones.

“This is very important because there was a concern around the community that we would open up stipends for elected officials and then all of a sudden we would be paying ourselves $200,000 a year, which is not true,” she said. “It was never intended that we would receive healthcare benefits, but we wanted to make sure that was in there.”

Jones addressed community concerns that elected officials receiving a stipend would no longer mean they are volunteers and instead be paid staff, which is not the case.

Including the amount elected officials would receive, which would not be allowed to be raised for at least 12 years until the next charter review, provides transparency and would raise taxes by $3.84 per household annually, according to Jones.

“There were rumors that it would cost the community thousands and thousands of dollars, which is not the case,” Jones said. “Receiving a stipend is not taking away from our volunteer status. The number that we came up with is equivalent to another community within Essex County that has the same special charter as us and the same form of government.”

Trustee Olivia Lewis-Chang said she was in favor of amending the charter because the town and the BOT have evolved; the elected officials are two-thirds women and of many different racial and ethnic backgrounds.

She also addressed the stipends when she spoke at the meeting.

“I feel like some of the behaviors around this idea that if we receive a stipend, we are less altruistic or less of a volunteer was particularly difficult to take,” Lewis-Chang said. “I feel the stipend represents a small token of a monetary contribution for the things we are going to do. I know how much time we spend here, and none of us are going to walk away from our day jobs for this stipend.”

Hilton voted against the ordinance because she thought the BOT was going about it the wrong way; she said at the meeting that she was agonizing over which way to vote. The only provision she disagreed with was the stipends.

“As our governing document, including a specific dollar amount that would stay stagnant over so many years is not the correct tool for the way to govern,” Hilton said.

“Second is the issue of cost control. We can all agree that our property taxes are too high, and we as trustees need to be doing everything we can to effectively balance the public good with the burden on our taxpayers. I believe that now is not the time to burden our taxpayers, even a little bit, for the purposes of a stipend.”

Hilton’s final reason for voting against the ordinance is that she ran for office knowing that it was a completely volunteer job and she would like to stay true to that commitment.

  South Orange Board of Trustees, South Orange Village