Financials

Return on Investment (ROI)

The ROI is forecast to be over 200% at the 5 year mark, and over 450% in 30 years. The ROI’s are based on using $1.97 million of cost as outlined to the right. Cash inflows include land price, permit fees, interest on cash, new Municipal property taxes, operating and capital savings, rental/program fees and debt service.

Project Garnet has already created $2.55 million in assets in the form of the buildings (SOF, Cabin and Community Center). It has also already started to produce cash towards the $2.31 million forecast for the first 5 years of the project from building rentals and program fees. Once the land is developed Project Garnet will produce an ongoing stream of $81,000 per year for the Municipality and $170,000 in new tax revenues for the School District, totaling $12 million over the next 30 years. This is all property tax reducing income to the rest of the Borough.

This is an excellent investment for the Borough in addressing the desire of our tax payers for a high quality Economic Development project and lower property taxes.

Borough Expense

The core of Project Garnet includes buying and retrofitting the NJ American Water buildings, moving employees and operations to the new facility, building out interiors, and removing UST soil from the former municipal public works property. “Other components” of Project Garnet include but not limited to the Recreational Cabin Project and Widening Lippincott Lane.

The costs are in line with expectations, no other costs are expected, and they produce the ROI outlined to the left.

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Our Residents and Property Owners Asked for Project Garnet!

In December 2008 a comprehensive Governing Body endorsed professional survey containing 56 questions was sent to each of the 2,748 property owners in Haddon Heights. We received back 942 responses representing a 34.3% response rate, an accurate representation of the opinion of the Borough. The question “How do you Rate the Amount & Quality of Economic Development in the Borough?” received the lowest rating of all 20 key services listed in the survey. In fact it was ranked 10% lower than the next lowest key Borough service. In response to this poor rating, Project Garnet was created and put into action.