Remember voting records at election time
As to the statement Mayor Nancy Grbelja made in the article "Tax bills spark need for damage control," I guess so, and the side of her face that the mayor is speaking out of this week is the one that says that the Township Committee does not control the 76 percent of the tax rate that goes to the schools.

Well, while speaking out of the other side of her face, she and the Township Committee were voting against the will of the taxpayers in the township that thought it was important enough to make the time to go out and vote the school budget down, only to have it pass, by what I believe was, a 2-1 vote. I would say those two people had plenty of say in the increase to our already too-high school tax bill. Much more say than the voters had. And didn't I read in your paper that the mayor works in some capacity for, I believe, the state board of education? And, if that is the case, I would think that her even voting on the matter would be a conflict of interest.

I don't know who came up with this stupid system, which is stacked in favor of the schools, that allows you to vote on a school budget and if it is voted down it is like they get a free spin. One of the excuses they gave for passing the budget was that there was such a low voter turnout, that, had it been higher, the budget would most likely have passed. What crystal ball did they use to come up with that?

Well, I say the low voter turnout is directly due to the fact that people are getting the attitude of why should I go out and vote, defeat the budget in order to keep taxes down, just to have a couple of people say they believe that the majority of people in Millstone are for the budget and they pass it despite what the voters said in the voting booth. The voters said no and that should have been the end of it. The mayor and the committee members have essentially taken away our right to vote on the school budget, so what's next? I know I will remember this at election time.

One last statement, with all the talk of selling state assets to pay down state debt and fund schools - maybe we should be thinking of privatizing the school system in this state because, let's face it, we are not very good at the education business. You could send a kid to private school for less than it costs to send a student to public school. That tells me the system is in bad shape. Privatize schools and fix the state budget at the same time.

Paul Donnelly

Millstone