From The Press of Atlantic City — Egg Harbor City is doing something too few towns do: It is re-evaluating whether a tax break is really needed.

Mayor Joseph Kuehner believes the town’s graduated municipal tax abatement for new commercial and industrial businesses is unnecessary. The abatement, he said, was meant to attract business to the industrial park. But some tenants moved in without even knowing there was a five-year abatement and applied for it retroactively – indicating the abatement wasn’t really needed to attract businesses in the first place, he said.

Other taxpayers pick up the tab for tax breaks granted at every level of government – federal, state and local. Too many times, these incentives are put into place and not looked at again for decades.

Last week, City Council in Egg Harbor City tabled until its Aug. 28 meeting the ordinance that would have eliminated the five-year abatement after some concerns arose about whether the measure would affect downtown businesses in the city’s redevelopment zone.

No matter what the final result, though, Egg Harbor City deserves credit both for understanding that tax breaks without a compelling purpose simply burden other taxpayers, and for opening up a debate about whether they are truly needed. Other towns – and the state, for that matter – ought to continuously re-evaluate their own programs.