Former Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop is pushing back against claims that his administration left behind a massive financial crisis, saying residents would not have faced this year’s roughly 15% municipal property tax increase had he remained in office.
The Jersey City Council approved a $886.4 million municipal budget on August 26, including a 15.15% increase in the city portion of the property tax rate. Current Mayor James Solomon has argued that the increase was necessary after his administration inherited what it describes as a roughly $255 million structural budget deficit.
Fulop strongly disputes that characterization.
“We obviously disagree. Had I chosen to run for re-election, we would have introduced another budget with no tax increase for Jersey City residents, as we did nearly every year,” Fulop told Hudson County View, according to HudPost.
He also rejected the claim that his administration left behind a $250 million-plus deficit, pointing to the recently released independent audit of Jersey City’s 2025 finances. Fulop said the audit does not identify a $250 million deficit and characterized the dispute as political rather than evidence of a fiscal crisis.
Solomon’s administration sees the situation very differently. Its June interim budget report estimated a $254.8 million structural gap and said the city entered 2026 with substantial unpaid obligations, including approximately $109 million in bills and deferred costs that the new administration says had to be addressed.
Solomon has also said his administration cut roughly $60 million in spending and secured $120 million in state assistance to prevent an even larger tax increase. The originally discussed increase had been as high as 20% before being reduced.
The disagreement has now turned Jersey City’s budget debate into a direct political clash between the current and former mayors: Solomon says the tax increase was necessary to repair finances inherited from the Fulop years, while Fulop says the supposed $255 million crisis is being overstated and that he could have delivered another budget without raising municipal taxes.
With Jersey City already looking toward its 2027 finances, that dispute is unlikely to disappear anytime soon.
Source: HudPost; Hudson County View; City of Jersey City.
By NJ RADAR Team