Fort Cherry tax collector opposes cut to her pay
The Fort Cherry tax collector is seeking to reverse a move by the district school board she claims would result in “an unreasonable and unfair decrease” in her pay for collecting school taxes.
Jamie Torboli, who is also the elected tax collector of Mt. Pleasant Township and collects district taxes, claimed in court papers that school district officials imposed a “drastic and unreasonable” cut to her pay with a decision to replace her $25,000-a-year salary with a rate of $1.50 per tax bill.
Torboli’s attorneys wrote in a complaint filed Oct. 31 in Washington County court that the board’s Jan. 23 resolution, which takes effect at the beginning of next year, would decrease her pay by 88 percent to about $3,045. Her complaint states her salary has been $25,000 since 1997.
Torboli’s attorneys cites case law purportedly showing the school board “is prohibited from setting a compensation rate that deprives the ability to perform the duties of their elected position” or is “unreasonable, arbitrary or capricious.”
“Because plaintiff is subject to the whim of the district to fix a rate of compensation for performance of the statutory obligations associated with the office, our (state) Supreme Court has determined that the compensation fixed by taxing districts cannot be unreasonable,” her lawyers wrote.
Fort Cherry Solicitor John Smart of law firm Andrews & Price couldn’t immediately be reached Thursday afternoon.
Torboli’s complaint seeks to vacate the resolution and restore her $25,000 salary. The Bucks County firm representing her, Eastburn & Gray, brought a similar case on behalf of four McGuffey tax collectors, with whom the district entered a settlement last month.