How do the days and months go by so quickly? It seems like such a short time ago that we were here at this point, closing out one year and preparing for the next.

With time going by so rapidly, each of us caught up in the busy-ness of our individual lives, sometimes we forget to stop and say thank you to all the people who matter in our lives.

Santa, Mrs. Claus and Arthur the Great Dane-deer, along with all of us here at The Citizen, wish our readers and their families the happiest of holidays and a safe, healthy and prosperous new year!

A healthy carry-over from 2011 helped convince Bellevue Council members that no property tax increase is necessary for 2012.

Council voted unanimously at its Dec. 30 meeting not to enact a proposed .25 mill tax increase, although members reversed themselves and voted for a 25 cent increase in the sewer surcharge per 1,000 gallons of water used. Council member Lisa Blaney-Stewart was absent from her final meeting.

Avalon Borough is starting off the year with a clean budgetary slate for a change, having ended 2009 in the black and adopting a $2.9 million spending plan for the new year.

Borough manager Harry Dilmore said that in past years, deficits had demanded about half of the borough's $300,000 tax anticipation loan be spent to clear up bills from the prior year. The loan is meant to keep government operating until tax revenues are received in the spring.