The Chatham Township committee unanimously passed their 2013 budget on first reading Thursday evening.

The budget calls for a reduced local tax levy from 2012 levels of 3/10 of a cent. For the average home assessed at $750,000, this would mean a tax decrease of $25.50.

The 2012 tax rate was at 28.8 cents per $100 of assessed value, for a total average municipal tax of $2,152. If the committee votes to approve the budget as proposed, that amount will fall to 28.5 cents per $100.

Administrator Thomas E. Ciccarone said Thursday, "as hard as it may be to believe, I actually made a mistake" in calculating the levy cap calculation.

The error happened due to a $144,000 emergency appropriation from 2011 storms which was applied to the 2012 budget. "In doing the levy cap ... calculation, there's a [deduction] from the cap base of that amount," Ciccarone said. "The net effect of that is that the maximum allowable amount for the tax levy is $8,952,805."

The amount to be raised by taxes—$8,574,639—did not change.

Ciccarone previously said the maximum allowable amount which could be raised by taxes in 2013 was $9,071,185. The corrected amount is $118,380 less than that, lessening the township's allowable bank cap for this year to $378,166.

On March 28 the committee will hold a public hearing on the budget and a final reading. If it is approved, the budget will go into effect for this year.

In 2011 and 2012, the township kept local taxes flat, thanks in a large part to the same things that have allowed them to lower the tax levy in 2013: shared services, ratables within the township and consolidating positions.