"Best Practices Checklist" for Municipalities

I am interested in politics, but I am no expert in politics.  Having this blog, however, has put me into the category of "Hyperlocal News."  So I joined the NJ Hyperlocal News Association.  Cool, huh?  (LOL.)

Well, today the NJHNA sent me a press release, and it sounded like a pretty good story.  So I decided to post it:

"Last week Governor Christie and the Department of Community Affairs released a "Best Practices Checklist" for municipalities receiving state aid. If your community wants to receive 100% of its state funding, the municipality will need to comply with 41 out of 50 of the items on the checklist. If your municipality fails to meet the established threshold, they will lose up to 5% of their state aid.

Last year the checklist was optional for municipalities. Starting last October DCA started requiring municipalities receiving transitional aid to adopt a series of waste-cutting measures, like pay to play reform.

This is the first year that DCA is tying the final amount of state aid to the number of waste-cutting measures a town is adopting.

Municipalities have been given a 50 item checklist sorted into 8 areas: general management, financial standards, budget preparation & presentation, health insurance, personnel, public safety, energy, and municipal & school district cost-sharing."

And, of course, this made me wonder; how is Woodbridge stacking up?  So, I contacted Town Hall, and this is what I was told:

"Woodbridge Township complied with 50 points last year and will submit 50 points this year. As a result, Woodbridge received 100 percent of State Aid last year and will again received the maximum award this year."

Well, that's good to know! :)