FACT: In 2022, your property taxes paid over $33,000 to give Elie Y. Katz and family the best NJ State full-family Employee Medical Plan that New Jersey offers. (Click Here) He has received this first-class coverage for 24 years!!

Does anyone else on our Council receive any healthcare because of their position? NO

 Why is this the case? Prior to 2010 all elected municipal councilmembers received healthcare benefits for themselves and their families as employees of their municipalities. In Teaneck, this was in addition to the $7,000/year stipend they were paid.

In 2010, Governor Christie signed into law, Chapter 2, P.L. 2010 on Local Units Health Benefits Programs. This new law ended the healthcare benefit for municipal Councilmembers. BUT, sitting councilmembers in 2010 were grandfathered under the new law as long as they continued to sit on the council OR until they graciously exempted themselves from the grandfather clause. Most affected councilmembers in New Jersey have given up their healthcare benefits.

Not incumbent Elie Y. Katz! 

Since this expense is significant, a majority of a council (4 of 7 members) can vote to end the benefit for grandfathered members. Such was the case in Rockaway Township, NJ. For the past 12 years, Elie Y. Katz has controlled the majority of the Council.

In early 2016 a minority member of the council, C. Alan Sohn, asked Katz if he would give up his state healthcare coverage as a benefit to the Teaneck taxpayers. Here is a 2-minute excerpt of the exchange between C. Katz and C. Sohn that every Teaneck Voices reader should see.

 Since the total amount in compensation the Town paid Council members last year was $86+ K, that means that the Katz’s share of the total – as one of 7 Councilmembers – was 46% while each of the other 6 members got 9%. (Any 5^th grader can do the math: Click Here)

But these cost figures are about to get much worse since the annual 2023 increase for State Health Benefit Program premiums is 20%.  It is unresolved exactly how that 20% will be divided between what we taxpayers pay for all employees’ health insurance and what the increase will be for the individual employee contributor. (Click Here)  The $60K Town employee who takes the same plan as Katz takes probably contributed @$6,000 in 2022 and that may jump to $6,800 in 2023. By contrast, Katz, if re-elected, will likely see his total family healthcare contribution go up $200 to $1,250.

 That would likely make the Katz family’s total health care cost significantly less than any other Teaneck family – including those on Medicare

Is that a FACT, that incumbent Elie Y. Katz, the self-announced protector of the Teaneck taxpayer,  wants you to know?