BOE Bancroft Plan Could Boost Costs By Nearly 60 Percent

An overflow crowd of about 200 people spilled out of side doors of the Municipal Hall auditorium on a rainy Wednesday night to hear a proposal by the Haddonfield school board to purchase the 18.7-acre, Bancroft property on Kings Highway East.

Highlights of the plan include adding several new turf athletic fields, a new high school library that could also replace the aging municipal library, hundreds of new parking spaces and a high-tech learning center to the existing high school adjacent to Bancroft. The proposal augments a borough cost estimate of a public purchase of the land by boosting the costs to $32.3 million, a nearly 60 percent increase.

The borough released a cost study for the Bancroft acquisition last month. The price was $19.52 million, $14.27 of which would be financed through tax dollars. That would mean a typical taxpayer with a home assessed at the borough average of $491,000 would pay an additional $271 a year in taxes for the next 20 years. The typical property tax bill in the borough is $12,000 yearly.

The school plan nearly doubles the taxpayer cost to $477.84 yearly for the typical home owner to finance $30 million of costs over 20 years. The borough plan adds $16 for every additional million dollars of costs. A similar calculation would hike the school-plan, taxpayer cost to $509.84 yearly.

Public reaction to the plan was mixed. A majority of the comments focused on speculation that the schools will sell an existing athletic field complex on Radnor Avenue for residential development, including low- to moderate-income housing. School officials said board President Steven Weinstein was misquoted in a story on The Retrospect weekly newspaper website last week as saying the Radnor Avenue site would be better for the affordable housing than the Bancroft site, which is projected to include 10 units of such housing if the project goes forward.

"I came here tonight 36 hours before giving birth to my baby," said Dr. Erin Pukenas, of Gill Road. "Any additional housing at the Radnor Field site will add overcrowding to schools and eliminate open space. I thought it was necessary to come here tonight to express my concern."

Pukenas said she owns two houses in the borough, including one near Radnor Field. She said she would be willing to pay higher taxes to help finance the public purchase of Bancroft, but does not support residential development at Radnor Field. She quickly left the packed auditorium after speaking.

"I'm trying not to go into labor," she said as she hurried away.

Others urged caution in adding new taxes.

"I hear a lot about wants here tonight," said resident Jane Garbowski. "I want a Mustang, but I can't afford it. There are people who have to move away from Haddonfield because they can't afford to stay here. We don't always have to have the best of everything."

The borough calculations did not include a new library and learning center the school board wants and additional field improvements, such as more fields than were included by the borough and artificial turf coverings for the fields.

Haddonfield’s average property tax of $12,088.88 is nearly twice the state average at $7,776, according to the state Department of Community Affairs. Haddonfield has the second highest average property tax bill in Camden County. It trails Tavistock, an exclusive enclave at the tip of Haddonfield, enclosed mostly in an exclusive golf course. Haddonfield's property tax bills are 27 percent higher than Voorhees, $8,777.41, third in the county.

Weinstein said the school board plan for Bancroft provides more value for the dollar than the borough plan.

"We've put together a plan to try to get to consensus on where we can come together to take on the challenges of the future," he said. "The learning center is one of the most important aspects of this plan. It's also important to consider that we have some of the best athletic teams in the region and the worst fields."

The Bancroft redevelopment has been a potentially divisive topic for more than a decade. The debate has been framed by whether to use the property for more open space, a high-school expansion and more athletic fields or for tax-generating businesses or housing. Borough commissioners had favored a plan to build an assisted-living retirement complex on the site, but a public backlash about "high-density" development forced them to scrap the plan and start over last December.

The commissioners are currently considering three development options that include a public purchase, like the school board wants, market-rate town homes or independent-living homes for senior citizens.

The property has been owned for the last 128 years by an institution established by Margaret Bancroft to rehabilitate people with developmental disabilities. Bancroft today is a national leader in treatments for brain injuries. Officials there need to upgrade facilities and have leaned toward selling its property in Haddonfield and relocating to do it.

Bancroft, a nonprofit, currently pays no municipal taxes.