Township Earns High Marks on State ‘Best Practices’ Survey

The township’s responses to a State Division of Local Government best practices questionnaire will qualify Bridgewater to receive the highest amount of government funding.

Township Administrator Robert Bogart explained that the state had sent the extensive questionnaire to each municipality. It required responses from several different municipal departments, as well as the governing body, and asked numerous procedural questions.

Such questions included whether the municipality has a provision to provide the governing body with budget information on a quarterly basis and if the town met the 2 percent cap on raises, Bogart said.

The questions, Bogart said, were about “all of the things the state has pushed over the years, to make sure the towns are doing them."

Through this questionnaire, Bogart said, the state is trying to be certain that the towns are being run properly.

“We scored very high, [96 percent] on it," he said. "For us, it was pretty simple."

The 96th percentile score qualifies Bridgewater to receive 100 percent of the state funding originally allotted to it.

As announced in , the township is set to receive $5,904,261 in state aid for 2011, the same as it received in 2010.

Bridgewater is being given $508,750 in consolidated municipal property tax relief aid (CMPTRA), and $5,391,429 in energy receipts tax distribution, as well as $4,062 through the garden state trust.

These funds are broken down into smaller payments to the township in each of the four quarters of the year.

The township council officially acknowledged receipt of the survey responses at its Aug. 15 meeting.