Tuesday, May 17, 2011
The K-8 school budget for 2011-12 is reduced by $300,000, leaving the average homeowner to pay about $50 more in taxes next year.
The Gloucester Township Board of Education unanimously approved a spending plan with an adjusted tax levy Monday night at Ann A. Mullen Middle School, cutting the 2011-12 school budget by $300,000. The Board of Education’s decision followed the unanimous certification of the adjusted K-8 district's budget by the Township Council earlier the same evening. The GTPS rejected budget, defeated in the April election by a relatively narrow margin, totaled $100,912,254. The approved budget calls for spending $100,612,254. The originally proposed tax rate of 94.96¢ per $100 of assessed property value would have resulted in the owner of the average-priced Gloucester Township home ($199,000) paying $1,889.70 in taxes to Gloucester Township Public …
Monday, April 11, 2011
Two incumbent Council members are not seeking reelection—at least it doesn't look like they are at the moment.
UPDATE 11:10 p.m.: Councilwoman Crystal Evans did not file a petition by Monday's deadline for the Township Council race, which will conclude with a Nov. 8 election, but indicated before and after Monday's Council meeting that she may be back. "Well, we'll see," she said before the meeting when asked whether she would run this year. "I think we just need to see what happens over the course of the rest of the year." "No. I want to say 'no,' because I'm not sure what the future holds right now," Evans said after the meeting when asked if the township had seen the last of her as a candidate for public office. "But I know we do need to change the mindset of this township and start looking toward doing new things and being open to new ideas." …
Friday, February 4, 2011
Councilwoman Crystal Evans recently learned the township had won a $3,000 grant from the state forestry commission.
Councilwoman Crystal Evans has sought and received a $3,000 grant from the state Forestry Commission to develop a Community Forestry Management Plan (CFMP) for the township. The "Green Communities" grant makes the township eligible for future grants to plant trees and to conduct storm-damage assessments and hazardous-tree removals. The daughter of an environmentalist, Evans sees this grant reward as an exciting and necessary development—one which she has been working on since May. “At the time, I was on the environmental committee,” she said this week. “John Schmidt from the New Jersey Community Forestry program contacted me about this. I talked to the mayor, and we decided to pursue this.” Evans saw a similar initiative take hold in …
39.821003
-75.040635
Gloucester Township Municipal Complex
1261 Chews Landing Rd, Laurel Springs, NJ
/articles/evans-helps-land-beautification-grant
1777809
/locations/8938412
Sunday, January 2, 2011
Councilwoman Crystal Evans maintains that she is still a Democrat, and still an independent thinker.
Councilwoman Crystal Evans said she remembers the first budget she voted on as a new member of the Gloucester Township Council. "I was brand new to the council, and I went there to vote on a budget that was worked on 18 months before," she said of the proposed tax increase. "I was given a packet. I told them that I hadn't had a chance to look at it yet. They said, 'Just say yes.'" According to Evans, this incident has turned out to be characteristic of her experience on the Gloucester Township Council, to which she assumed office in January 2008. Since then, Evans, a Democrat, has broken ranks from the party, publicly supporting former mayor Cindy Rau Hatton, a Republican, in her bid for re-election, and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie in …
39.821003
-75.040635
Gloucester Township Municipal Complex
1261 Chews Landing Rd, Laurel Springs, NJ
/articles/evans-its-about-people-not-parties
1777809
/locations/2941342
Saturday, December 18, 2010
The Township Council recently voted to reopen bidding for snow removal.
Step outside and it is evident that Old Man Winter has arrived. The area saw some early holiday snowfall on Thursday, leaving residents scrambling for scrapers and looking for salt trucks. Snow removal has recently become an icy-hot topic in Gloucester Township. According to Councilwoman Crystal Evans, the township spent $1.35 million on snow removal last year, when Camden County endured an unprecedented 80 inches of snow. The council passed a motion at its Nov. 22 meeting that reopened the bidding process for snow removal. Evans was the only council member to vote against the measure. In an interview with Patch, she said that in times of such financial crisis, the bids "are just way off the mark." In February, the Philadelphia Inquirer …
39.78951
-75.02976
Gloucester Township Department of Public Works
1729 Erial Rd, Blackwood, NJ
/articles/gloucester-township-reopens-snow-removal-bidding
1799254
/locations/2800336
l Paine
2:59 pm on Friday, June 10, 2011
Would you expect anything less from this Board and the current crop top Administrators in the District they had the power to do something and chose not to. It's the same message over and over "do as I say, not as I do" whether it be simple morals like in the case you stated or preaching fiscal responsibility to the public and then spending in a mad rush what you haven't used before June 30. You … more ›