I see on the nj.com forum that the owners of the mt hope hydro project have resubmitted applications for the pumped storage project. Possibly the cost of building new power plants has increased to the point where something like this is economically viable. This could mean a huge source of tax revenues and, if it ever is built, should substantially reduce our property taxes.
I'd love to think that'd be the case...but I find it hard to believe we will ever, ever see our taxes decrease, no matter what happens. I can't even envision having a year where they stay the same.
Unless of course you move to another state!
That sort of thing just doesn't seem to happen here...
This would result in a huge increase in tax revenues with very little additional expense. The town of Blairstown hosts a somewhat similar project call the Yards Creek Hydroelectric Plant and their taxes are very substantially less than neighboring communities. Their hydro plant uses an upper and lower resevoir and I believe is valued at much less than the $2 billion that the Mr Hope project contemplates. The nice thing is that unlike other power plants, most of the equipment and visual impact would be below ground in the mine shafts.
