Corzine, Christie in a rut on property taxes

With the average New Jersey property tax bill now topping $7,000, Republican Christopher J. Christie and Democratic Gov. Corzine have pointed to increased property-tax rebates and more encouragement for local government consolidation as key initiatives to relieve property-tax burdens.

Both ideas have been tried, with little lasting impact. Rebates have proved an inconsistent salve, soaring in boom times and election years and falling off later.

Consolidation has been discussed as a promising theory for decades, but with few major success stories in practice. Meanwhile, the average property tax bill has grown by 71 percent since 1998 and public opinion polls consistently show it as voters' top concern.

Neither candidate has proposed an extensive new plan on the issue, although Corzine argues that he has already set the stage for relief with increased state aid for schools, a more balanced system of distributing that money, and a 4 percent cap on annual property-tax increases. The average property-tax increase slowed to 3.7 percent in 2008, the lowest increase in nearly a decade.

Though Corzine has not offered any new prescriptions - the section of his Web site listing second-term plans doesn't mention property taxes - he said those steps, along with more effort to merge local governments, would continue to eat away at the problem.

"We've got programs to get at the root causes," he said.

But Christie said Corzine had already failed to deliver on his main campaign promise: a 40 percent rebate increase. "Nobody in the state believes he's done anything to help property taxes and the reason they don't believe him is because of the trail of broken promises he's left," Christie said.

Corzine has fired back, criticizing Christie for pledging to increase rebates without saying by how much or when. Corzine said the Republican's budget won't add up if he intends to both cut taxes and increase the rebates.

"Making tough decisions in a tough environment is what being a governor is about," Corzine said in the first gubernatorial debate. "No plan is not what being a governor is about."

So far the most detailed new proposal has come from independent candidate Chris Daggett, who called for 25 percent property-tax credits, up to $2,500, for all homeowners. He would pay for the credits by expanding the state sales tax to cover more services and eliminating rebates and other relief programs.

"My opponents talk about nothing. They never get into details," Daggett said when he presented his idea. "I think my plan compares favorably, but virtually anything would compare favorably to what they've put forward so far."

He called rebates a "sham" that takes tax money, "massages" it, and sends some back to residents.

Over the years there have been several promises of bigger checks, funded by higher income or sales taxes, but the program was later curtailed.

In separate interviews, Corzine and Christie each praised rebates, saying they put money directly into homeowners' pockets until a more lasting answer, such as reducing the levels of local government, can be found.

Both criticized Daggett's plan for raising sales taxes by roughly $4 billion. Daggett has said his system would provide a fairer balance of taxes.

Corzine said he would like to restore rebates to the record levels he set in 2007 but he didn't commit to reaching that amount and acknowledged that other priorities, such as education and pension funding, would be competing for state's funding.

He has also said he would like to extend the "senior freeze" program, which reimburses eligible senior citizens for property-tax increases, to other low-income homeowners.

Corzine said he hoped to continue with a municipal and school district consolidation push that began in 2007.

Christie isn't making any big promises, other than to say that he will follow through on those issues - such as property-tax relief - that he intends to make a priority. He said rebate amounts in his administration would depend on economic conditions.