Assembly Dem Middle-Class Property Tax Relief Plan Would Help Ease Christie Property Tax Increase Burden
Assembly Majority Leader Louis Greenwald, Assemblywoman Connie Wagner and Assemblyman Timothy Eustace on Thursday said their visit to the home of a Bergen County family further showed the need for the Assembly Democratic plan to provide a 20 percent property tax relief credit for New Jersey homeowners.
Property taxes have increased a net 20 percent under right-wing conservative Gov. Chris Christie, yet the governor continues to push an income tax scheme that would mostly benefit the state’s wealthiest residents.
Greenwald, Wagner and Eustace joined the Johnson family of Saddle Brook to discuss how the Assembly Democratic property tax relief credit would provide an average of nearly $1,600 for middle-class families and nearly $2,000 for senior and disabled citizens.
“Gov. Christie’s obsession with lucrative tax cuts for the mega-rich has devastated New Jersey’s middle-class, but our plan steers us in the right direction and helps ease the Christie property tax burden that crushes our middle-class and seniors,” said Greenwald (D-Camden/Burlington). “We’re providing help to our middle-class families who have suffered while Gov. Christie protected tax cuts to the ultra-wealthy, and we’re targeting the pain eating away at our hard working families – the property tax. Everyone should rally behind this plan on behalf of our middle-class and seniors.”
“Middle-class and senior citizen property tax relief must be our priority, not tax schemes that benefit the rich at the expense of the middle-class,” said Wagner (D-Bergen). “New Jersey families have endured a net 20 percent property tax increase since Gov. Christie took office, while millionaires have had $40,000 annual tax breaks protected by this governor. We need to focus on doing what’s right for our middle-class and senior citizens.”
“Significant, real and responsible property tax relief for our middle-class and senior citizens is a must,” said Eustace (D-Bergen). “Our hard-working families deserve economic fairness, but this governor’s philosophy of tax breaks for the rich and property tax increases for everyone else is wrong for our middle-class. This plan helps our middle-class and seniors and puts us back on the right course.”
Greenwald and Assemblymen Wayne DeAngelo and Daniel R. Benson (both D-Mercer/Middlesex) also recently visited the home of a Mercer County family to discuss the plan. Greenwald also spoke to the AARP via a tele-town hall meeting in which 87 percent of the listeners gave the Assembly Democratic plan a “thumbs-up.”
Under the Assembly Democratic plan, residents earning up to $250,000 per year would receive a 20 percent property tax relief credit against the first $10,000 paid in property taxes – resulting in significant and immediate property tax relief to 95 percent of households.
The credit would rise to 25 percent for senior citizens and disabled residents.
This would provide nearly $1,600 to middle-class families and nearly $2,000 for senior and disabled citizens.
To view the Assembly Democratic plan visit https://www.assemblydems.com/proptax.pdf.
The Assembly Democratic plan provides these significant levels of relief by moving 16,000 millionaires back to their fiscal year 2010 income tax rates – eliminating a tax break through which millionaires have received an average of $40,000 per year for each of the past two years. Christie, meanwhile, has proposed an income tax scheme that would benefit wealthy New Jerseyans the most.