Bergen County Executive Kathleen Donovan said she could reduce residents’ taxes by one third and save millions of dollars if municipalities would consolidate their services. Donovan sat down with NJToday Managing Editor Mike Schneider to discuss shared services, her recent fight with the freeholders and if the Republican party is fractured.

Donovan said she is in favor of municipalities sharing services to save money, despite some criticism she has received. “I didn’t get elected to just keep things as they were,” she said. “They would’ve stayed with the person who was there before me.”

She said that New Jersey has too many layers of government that could be shared. “I could cut people’s taxes probably by a third if they would begin to consolidate,” Donovan said. “Not towns. We live on our own little piece of paradise. But if we could consolidate towns’ services we would save millions of dollars.”

In Bergen County, Donovan said officials are moving more toward shared services. “The 2 percent caps on budgets in the towns has been a startling change in people’s minds because they just cannot keep raising taxes to fulfill what people thought they needed or wanted,” she said. “I think you’re going to see over the next two to three years the whole sea change.”

Donovan also discussed the recent spat with county freeholders where her office was granted a temporary restraining order after going to court. She explained that the county executive or her designated representative has the same speaking rights as freeholders during meetings. “The freeholder chair decided he was going to muzzle my county administrator,” she said.

The freeholder board has five Republicans and two Democrats. When asked if the recent fighting indicated that the Republican party is fracturing, Donovan said no. “Bergen County’s got 905,000 people so any party among 905,000 people, which is larger than the populations of six states, are going to have individual discussions … among the people involved,” she explained. “It’s not fracturing.”

Donovan admitted that one of her aids was threatened by a Republican leader, but declined to comment further on the incident.

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