Your Turn Alan S. Godber Guest Column Public input needed on Ford Avenue plan In the recent article on the Ford Avenue redevelopment ("Agreement Lays Out Future for Ford Avenue," Sentinel, May 13), I was correctly quoted as saying that I am concerned, as chairman of the Milltown Environmental Commission (and as a resident of Milltown for 26 years) that essentially the public has not been a part of the process of determining how the site at Ford Avenue should be developed. Of course, there must have been one-on-one comments and opinions given about redevelopment of the site. However, I am not aware of any public meetings, hearings, forums or any other opportunity for the public to debate how it would like that area to look in the future and to debate the impact on the borough as a whole. At many meetings of the Ford Avenue Redevelopment Agency, the public has asked questions and made comments and was told it was too early and that there would be plenty of time in the future to give input and opinions. As a developer’s agreement is now in place, it would seem that now it may be too late to provide opinions on how the site should be developed. The guidance manual from the state of New Jersey for the use of redevelopment agencies, in the introductory section, says that the public should be involved in the whole process from day No. 1. This essentially has not occurred, and we are now at least two years into the process. Whatever plan is adopted for Ford Avenue, which is large enough to have a major impact on the borough, should be in concert with a plan for how Milltown should look 25-50 years into the future. I have not heard of or seen any such study or plan. There are many issues concerned with land use and property taxes that do not seem to be well-understood. Much data from across the country shows that the larger a community grows, the higher the taxes per individual taxpayer. The more open space, the lower the property taxes and the higher the property values. There are good and poor tax ratables. The amount and type of municipal services that must be provided for each property vary according to the type of property. A good tax ratable is one where the cost of services provided by the community are much less than the tax paid. For a poor tax ratable, the cost of services exceeds the tax paid. The best tax ratable is farmland, the second best is industry, the third is commercial use. Single-family homes are the worst tax ratable, and age-re­stricted homes have a tax impact that is somewhere in between. The Ford Avenue redevelopment should provide a suitable mix of uses, which will reduce the property taxes in town so that current residents can plan to remain in their homes and not have to move to other communities. This type of process is being followed suc­cessfully in other forward-looking towns across New Jersey, and it should be done here. The current plan to provide a large number of resi­dences is not a good recipe for lower­ing taxes. We will be pleased to dis­cuss the details of these issues in any public debate on the matter. The people who are criticized as naysayers are actually those who are taking the trouble to think of what is best for the future of Milltown, and I would encourage more residents to contribute input so that we have a community of which we can all be proud for the next century or so. We appreciate the dedication and efforts put in by those associated with the redevelopment agency, but they should have more input from a variety of sources. I recommend that the public come to the Planning Board meetings at Borough Hall at 8 p.m. on Tuesday, June 1, and Tuesday, July 6, when the ordinance related to the Ford Avenue redevelopment will be reviewed. Alan S. Godber is chairman of the Milltown Environmental Commission