VIDEO: New Jersey man dances at town hall meeting to protest property tax hike
Americans are famous for our creative dissents against taxes — just take the Boston Tea Party. Last week, a New Jersey man carried on the tradition at a town meeting by dancing to express his response to a property tax hike.
In a video livestreamed on Cranford TV-35, Will Thilly, a candidate for the Cranford township committee, gets out of his seat and dances his way up to the podium. An official tells him, "I started your time," and Thilly holds up his finger as he continues dancing.
He pauses to grab a bottle of water and pieces of paper before asking the audience about their weekends.
"Did you know I could do the backspin? Anybody?" he says. "Wanna see me do the backspin? No? I'm gonna do the backspin."
After proceeding to do so and unsuccessfully motioning for the audience to applaud, Thilly jumps into his remarks.
"Well, why did our taxes go up so much? We were told the referendum was going to bring it up for an average household about $400," he says. "And mine went up, like, 900 bucks. I think we were told, like, that was from the schools or something? But the school referendum said it would only go up, like I said, 400 bucks on an average assessed home."
"So I wanted to know why it went up, if it did much more than that," he goes on. "And what extra expenses were incurred by the schools that weren’t told to the public when we voted on that referendum?"
Thilly then moonwalks back to his seat.
"Thank you, Mr. Thilly," Cranford Mayor Terrence Curran then says, according to . "I like the interpretative dance."
Cranford is a town of less than 25,000 people as of the 2020 census, located 18 miles southwest of Manhattan. Thilly's campaign website says he is running to "tell you the truth, to fight for what you need, and to defend our Town and schools," explaining that he opposes "$150 million in 30-year tax exemptions to billionaire developers" for a development in his town.
