A report on Fox5 Wednesday tees up local rock stars Bruce Springsteen, Bon Jovi and Max Weinberg for “the huge tax breaks” they get for claiming parts of their estates in Colts Neck and Middletown as farmland. According to Fox reporter Barbara Nevins Taylor, Bon Jovi’s Navesink River estate in Middletown, on which he pays $296,000 a year in local property taxes, is cited for paying just $104 on 6.85 acres used to raise honeybees. Springsteen pays more than $138,000 a year in taxes on his three-acre Colts Neck home, but just $4,639 on the adjoining 200 acres, which is organically farmed and has horses, according to the report. E Street Band drummer Weinberg pays $49,000 on his two-acre residence on McClees Road in Middletown, but just just $122 on the additional 34 acres “because he sells wood,” says Nevins Taylor. A lawyer for the trust that owns Springsteen’s spread had no comment, Nevins Taylor reports. Bon Jovi, through a spokesman, said the beekeeping operation was in place on his before he bought it. State Senator Jennifer Beck of Red Bank appears in the segment, calling the state law that requires owners of properties as small as five acres to sell just $500 worth of agricultural products in order to qualify for the exemption “a very low bar. “I think it is unfair to our other property taxpayers that if you are a fake farmer, and that you don’t legitimately farm, that you are getting a property tax break and forcing your neighbors to pick up your tab,” Beck says. “That was not the intent of the law. It’s a violation of the public trust.” Beck has taken on the tax break before, most notably in her 2007 campaign for state Senate, when she challenged her opponent, Ellen Karcher, for benefitting from it. Also interviewed is Middletown Administrator Tony Mercantante, who suggests the law, while it “has enabled farmers to survive,” needs fine-tuning.
Yes, this is a tax dodge that's been going on for quite a while. Large landowners make up some kind of "farming" on their land and get the break. Here's another egregious example: Developer Hovsons Inc., for example, owns 20.8 acres along the scenic Navesink River in Middletown, one of the most exclusive areas in the state. The address is also the home of Hirair Hovnanian, patriarch of the Hovsons building empire. On the palatial estate, complete with tennis court, pool and boat dock, Hovsons Inc. paid $214,000 in property taxes for 10.3 acres of non-farm assessed land. Yet for the surrounding 10.5 acres of farm-assessed land, the Tinton Falls-based company paid $31 in property taxes. If it wasn’t assessed as a farm, the tax on the 10 acres likely would range from $150,000 to $250,000 a year, based on the value of the non-farm Hovsons Inc. land and the assessment of a nearby riverfront parcel How did Hovsons do it? To qualify for the tax break, the company sold $600 worth of honey produced by 22 beehives, according to tax records. Calls to Hovsons Inc. for comment were not returned. The rolls of those with farm-assessed land in New Jersey read like a who’s who in the world of high finance, business and entertainment. Those in the rich-and-famous category with approved applications for tax breaks in 2009 and 2010 include: - Financier Michael C. Price, with a net worth of $1.4 billion, Bedminster: 92 farm-assessed acres, on which he paid $359 in taxes in 2009. – Robert Wood “Woody” Johnson IV, heir to Johnson & Johnson and owner of the New York Jets football team, Bedminster: 269 acres, $1,470 in 2009. – Publishing magnate Donald E. Newhouse, with a net worth of $5.4 billion, Hopewell Township: 273 acres, $1,787 in taxes for 2010; in West Amwell, 77 acres, $611 in taxes in 2010. – Publishing magnate Malcolm “Steve” Forbes, including properties with his wife, Sabina, Bedminster: 450 acres, $2,005 in taxes in 2009. – E Street Band drummer Max Weinberg, Middletown: 34 acres, $122 in taxes in 2010. – Rock star Jon Bon Jovi, Middletown: 7.1 acres, $104 in taxes in 2010. - Lamington Farm Club, under the corporate umbrella of entrepreneur and TV personality Donald Trump, Bedminster: 195 acres; $277. – John Whitman, husband of former Gov. Christie Whitman, Tewksbury: 167 acres, $1,521; in Bedminster: 65 acres; $173. – Vernon Hill II, former CEO of Commerce Bank, Moorestown: 29 acres, $79 in 2010. .