West Deptford Committee Approves Bill Transfers, Queen St. Payments

After taking a mulligan on its first attempt to reconcile some line items in its 2013 municipal budget, the West Deptford township committee unanimously approved a $328,000 funds transfer to fulfill municipal appropriations in the budget at its November 21 meeting.

Government leaders doubled back on a handful of cuts that had been characterized as fat-trimming over the summer, when Republican Commiteeman Sam Cianfarini decried prior years' appropriations as "sloppy budgeting," and sliced it down from 2012 levels by $800,000.

The big-ticket items in the move were solid waste collection, into which the government authorized a transfer of $125,000 on Thursday, followed by salaries and wages for RiverWinds ($45,000) and construction employees ($34,000).

Leaf collection, which had not been included in the transfer resolution attempted on November 7, was floated an additional $25,000 in the vote on Thursday. 

Just four months earlier, Cianfarini oversaw year-over-year cuts of $75,000 (from the 2012 to 2013 budgets) in solid waste collection and $60,000 in leaf collection.

He offered no comment on the transfers after the meeting.

Mayor Ray Chintall (R) told Patch that the fund transfer is "typical" and "allowed by law." He blamed prior years' budgeting issues on the absence of proper accounting software in the CFO's office.

"In the past, we did the close-out and we had no idea whether a line item was in the red," Chintall said.

Township Administrator Eric Campo said that West Deptford "most likely" will be able to make the transfers without an impact to its bottom line, but added that the process is not a preferable one because it could leave other areas lacking resources.

"You're not going to have reserves left over in any of those line items," Campo said. "If they get arbitrarily cut, that leaves another area short."

At $90,000, the single biggest line item to contribute to the $328,000 transfer was legal services/other expenses, for which $465,000 had been previously budgeted, according to the resolution.

Queen Street improvements

The committee also approved a voucher of $199,053.85 to Landberg Construction, LLC for work performed on the previously authorized Queen Street improvement project.

Campo explained that the project was accounted for in the 2012 municipal budget at a total of $255,309.67, some $175,000 of which will be funded by a grant from the New Jersey Department of Transportation.

"There's still a portion of it left to complete," he said, which will be funded by money allocated in the 2012 budget.