For Immediate Release Press
Release Date:
February
6, 2009
Mayor
Victor De Luca today announced the layoffs of 17 Township employees effective March 6th. The
layoffs are part of a $1 million cost cutting plan designed to bring municipal spending in line with available resources.
Additionally, five full-time employees
will be reduced to part-time and two current vacancies will not be filled. The Mayor and Township Committee also announced that beginning in June and extending through Labor Day, township
offices will be closed on Fridays, resulting in the furloughing of all employees, except police officers and firefighters,
for a total of 12 days.
Mayor De Luca, Township Committeeman Lester Lewis-Powder
and Township Administrator Joseph Manning presented the plan this morning to department heads and then met with representatives
of the Communications Workers of America Local 1031 and UTC&IEIU Local 621, which represent the employees.
The twenty-two employees
affected represent slightly more than ten percent of the Township’s employees other than police officers and firefighters.
The reduction in
force will save about $1 million of the $2.5 million current gap in the Township’s $38 million municipal budget. The Township Committee, which unanimously endorsed
the plan, will continue to look for cost savings in the municipal budget prior to its introduction in March.
They also are open to considering serious, alternative
cost saving measures that the unions may propose.
“This was not an easy decision to make,”
said De Luca. “Our employees do a great job and we do not want to lose them. We certainly did not want to contribute
to the growing number of unemployed in our country. But we have limited choices available to us. Not only do we face a state
imposed 4% tax cap, we must also do what we can to limit this year’s tax increase when families throughout our community
are facing economic difficulties and uncertainties like never before.”
