Two of the three homes in Tavistock, which back up to the renowned golf-course, can be seen above.
Saed Hindash | For NJ.com
By Bill Duhart | For NJ.com
Meet Tavistock, the tiniest municipality in New Jersey. This small borough of less than a dozen residents is the epitome of "home rule" in the Garden State.
Driving down Warwick Road through the leafy neighboring community of Haddonfield —about 12 miles outside of Philadelphia — one could easily motor past the quick left turn on to Tavistock Lane, the only public road in the town, which is more like a driveway than a street.
The less-than-quarter-mile stretch ends at the first tee of the tony, private Tavistock Golf Course. Along the way, three stately multi-million dollar mansions line the south side of the lane.
That's it. That's Tavistock. Blink and you'll miss it.
With a quiet history of almost 100 years of exclusivity and privilege, Tavistock consistently ranks as the municipality whose homeowners have the highest average tax bill in the state at about $31,000. While it could be an argument for the need to consolidate, those who call Tavistock home say they have no plans of ever changing
"We're preparing for our centennial celebration in 2021," said Tavistock Mayor John Aglialoro. "In 2121, our town will still be the same."
The Tavistock Country Club in the 1925.
Historical Society of Haddonfield
Just trying to get a tee time
What do you do when you're rich, you want to play golf on Sunday, but your country club doesn't allow it? You start your own club in a brand new town, of course.
That's where Frank Middleton came in. He was an executive of the Victor Talking Machine Company in Camden two decades into the 20th Century. It later became RCA, the Radio Corporation of America, the foremost manufacturer of groundbreaking entertainment machines that played recordings of speech and music that changed the face of home entertainment.
Middleton — a member of the Haddon Country Club saddled with Sunday Blue Laws that prohibited sports — had a new plan.
He bought a 180-acre stretch of former farmland just over the Haddonfield borough line in 1920, on the edge of what was then Centre Township. He enlisted nearly 200 members of their current club to join the new club and sold some of them shares of their new promised land.
One of the newest members was state Sen. Joseph Wallworth, who crafted a bill establishing the new municipality of Tavistock. The bill passed unanimously in 1921 with the help of the state General Assembly Speaker T. Harry Rowland, also a member of the new Tavistock Country Club, according to published reports of the day.
"They were a bunch of rich guys who were politically connected," said Kathy Tassini, a member of the Haddonfield Historical Society.
Still just as exclusive
Nearly 100 years later, Tavistock is still just a golf course and an enclave of homes — both of which are the allure for its handful of residents.
The club is privately-owned with more than 400 members with an equity stake, and it continues to thrive with golfers, weddings parties and other social engagements.
The homes that line Tavistock Lane have backyards that border the course's rolling green hills.
"It's a town with three homes not 3,000," Aglialoro said to a reporter in March at one of the commission's six annual meetings. "We've got a golf course. It's the size that sparks interests. Other than that, we're just like any other town."
Hardly.
The borough of Tavistock holds their council meeting at the UM Holdings Ltd. building in Haddonfield.
Tim Hawk | For NJ.com
Rather than a municipal building with a meeting room, Tavistock's commission meetings are held inside the ornate, third-floor boardroom of Aglialoro and his wife Joan Carter's office building — home to their venture capitalist firm UM Holdings, Ltd. — less than 2 miles away in Haddonfield.
The husband and wife duo who live in a $1.5 million home they purchased 35 years ago make up two-thirds of the governing body. Their counterpart is Joseph DelDuca, an attorney who moved to Tavistock in 2012.
The room is unlike most found in municipal offices that have rows of uncomfortable chairs, a podium for public speakers and portraits of past mayors. At this meeting space, the long, polished wooden conference table reflects like a mirror. Artwork, that appeared to be numbered, limited-edition Norman Rockwell prints — three in all — hang on the walls.
Gathered around the table at the meeting were the other players with vested interest in Tavistock's happenings — Tavistock Country Club General Manager Colin Mark-Allen, Tavistock Country Club President Steve Wolschina, the part-time municipal clerk and the borough's auditor.
Tavistock Mayor John Aglialoro talks during the boroughs council meeting at the UM Holdings Ltd. building in Haddonfield.
Tim Hawk | For NJ.com
Meet the residents
An entrepreneur.
A venture capitalist and an activist.
A lawyer.
An upscale golf club manager.
Now you've met the whole town. Well, almost.
Tavistock Mayor John Aglialoro talks during the boroughs council meeting at the UM Holdings Ltd. building in Haddonfield.
Tim Hawk | For NJ.com
John Aglialoro
Aglialoro, 75, was listed among the 25 richest small-business owners in the nation by Fortune magazine in 2007. He and his wife are co-founders of UM Holdings, Ltd., a private equity company that — among many other investments — owned Cybex, an exercise equipment company they sold two years ago for $195 million, according to published reports.
He also independently produced the movie trilogy Atlas Shrugged, based on Ayn Rand's best-selling novel.
Joan Carter, a commissioner in the borough of Tavistock, speaks during their council meeting at the UM Holdings Ltd. building in Haddonfield.
Tim Hawk | For NJ.com
Joan Carter
Along with being the president of UM Holdings, Carter, 75, is the chairman of FreedomWorks, a political action committee that funds conservative, small-government candidates — largely Republicans — for public offices around the nation, according to her Freedomworks bio. She was also the first woman president of the Union League of Philadelphia — a politically conservative group for the region's elite.
Her biography lists numerous other boards and groups where she serves as a member or trustee, including Penn Mutual Life Insurance Co. and Lourdes Health System.
Commissioner Joseph Del Duca's home in the borough of Tavistock.
Tim Hawk | For NJ.com
Joseph Del Duca
The newest residents in town are the Del Duca family. Joseph Del Duca is a partner and general counsel at the Walters Group, according to the law firm's website.
He leased under an acre of land from the country club in 2012 and built a $1.37 million house on it, according to tax records and a lease obtained at the Camden County clerk's office. When Del Duca's family moved in, they increased the town's voter rolls from four to nine, according county voter lists.
Colin Mack-Allen, general manager of Tavistock Country Club, listens during the buroughs council meeting at the UM Holdings Ltd. building in Haddonfield.
Tim Hawk | For NJ.com
Colin Mack-Allen
Colin Mack-Allen became the general manager of the Tavistock Country club in 2012, succeeding the man who held the job for 39 years. He, his wife and two school-aged children live in a house on the golf course property, only accessible by a narrow road through the course behind the main building.
The club manager has lived in the home since Sam Fulton — who was club president and a past mayor — took up residence there in 1945. The club bought the home in 1987 after Fulton died, according to the country club's history.
The Buff family estate in Tavistock.
Tim Hawk | For NJ.com
The Buff Estate
The third house on Tavistock Lane is the most valuable property of the three — it's assessed at $2.3 million — but it's unclear if anyone's living there.
The home has been in the family of George Buff III — whose father, George Buff, Jr., helped invent the first disposable pie pan out of aluminum in 1948. The family's company, Penny Plate, is still involved in foil pan production and it revolutionized disposable products, such as TV dinners.
Buff III, who is 77, moved out of Tavistock in 2011, transferred the house to Tavis Holdings Trust for $1, and moved to Florida.
The Buff family — including George Buff IV, and his son (also named George) — now live at a $2.2 million estate in West Palm Beach, Florida, a block from President Donald Trump's Mar-A-lago resort.
The home of John Aglialoro and his wife Joan Carter in Tavistock is valued at just under $1.5 million.
Tim Hawk | For NJ.com
The price of luxury
New Jersey has the highest property taxes in the nation, and nowhere else is that more true than in Tavistock, where a single house — the one once owned by the Buffs — had to pay $41,630 in 2016.
The other homeowners in town had bills upwards of $24,000 and the country club itself (technically the only non-residential ratable in town) paid about $220,000.
Don't let the price tag on their property tax bill fool you, said Carter.
"We are the absolute model for a municipality," Carter said. "We don't have our own fire department. We don't have our own police department. We don't have our own school system. That is the reason having 500 some-odd municipalities is a problem. All of these things are duplicative. In our situation, none of these things are duplicative. We purchase all the services we have (so) we don't duplicate."
Bill Duhart | For NJ.com
They pay neighboring Haddonfield for police, fire and public works as well as tuition to send the two Tavistock children to school there.
Just five people are employed part-time in Tavistock, which accounts for the bulk of their local expenses at about $70,000.
Small municipalities like theirs would seem to be directly in the crosshairs of ongoing efforts to consolidate public services and encourage towns to merge to reduce expenses.
But Michael Darcy, the executive director of the state League of Municipalities, thinks towns like Tavistock are part of what makes New Jersey a unique place to live.
"What makes Tavistock a problem?" Darcy asked. "The people that live there pay the taxes. They seem to enjoy it. They don't want to merge with another community, so what's the problem?
"If you want to talk about the concerns people have with a lot of small municipalities in New Jersey, Tavistock would not be the place to go have that conversation," Darcy said.
But it might be a place to go for a great round of golf.
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Bill Duhart may be reached at bduhart@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @bduhart. Find NJ.com on Facebook.Have a tip? Tell us. nj.com/tipsa
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