133 N.J. 482 (1993) 628 A.2d 288

TOWN OF SECAUCUS, PLAINTIFF-RESPONDENT,
v.
HUDSON COUNTY BOARD OF TAXATION AND CITY OF BAYONNE, DEFENDANTS-APPELLANTS, AND COUNTY OF HUDSON, BOROUGH OF EAST NEWARK, TOWN OF GUTTENBERG, TOWN OF HARRISON, CITY OF HOBOKEN, CITY OF JERSEY CITY, TOWN OF KEARNY, TOWNSHIP OF NORTH BERGEN, CITY OF UNION CITY, TOWNSHIP OF WEEHAWKEN AND TOWN OF WEST NEW YORK, DEFENDANTS.

The Supreme Court of New Jersey.

Argued February 17, 1993. Decided August 4, 1993.

*485 Margaret A. Holland, Deputy Attorney General, argued the cause for appellant Hudson County Board of Taxation (Robert J. Del Tufo, Attorney General of New Jersey, attorney; Joseph L. Yannotti, Assistant Attorney General, and Mary C. Jacobson, Deputy Attorney General, of counsel).

Eric Martin Bernstein argued the cause of appellant City of Bayonne (Weiner & Lesniak, attorneys; Mr. Bernstein, Beth Jaffe, and Nicholas A. Panepinto, of counsel).

*486 Frances C. Holland argued the cause for respondent (Holland & Holland, attorneys).

The opinion of the Court was delivered by HANDLER, J.

This case asks the Court to resolve the question whether a statute enacted under the education laws that exempts the City of Bayonne from paying its share of taxes committed to the operation of the Hudson County Vocational School violates the State Constitution. In implementing the tax exemption, Hudson County established a two-tier tax system under which Bayonne paid a county tax rate lower than that of all other municipalities in Hudson County. The Town of Secaucus challenged that two-tier system as violating both the prohibition on special legislation, article IV, section 7, paragraph 9(6), and the uniformity clause, article VIII, section 1, paragraph 1, of the New Jersey Constitution. The trial court found for Secaucus on both those grounds. The Appellate Division affirmed that decision on uniformity clause grounds, but failed to reach the question of whether N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 constituted special legislation. Secaucus v. Hudson County, 255 N.J. Super. 665, 605 A.2d 1151 (1992).

The Hudson County Board of Taxation petitioned this Court from that decision and we granted certification, 130 N.J. 396, 614 A.2d 618 (1993), to decide whether the exemption statute is constitutionally invalid.

I

The City of Bayonne, located in Hudson County, has operated a vocational-educational program since 1931. Originally, Bayonne implemented that program through a separate vocational high school. In the 1960s, however, Bayonne created a comprehensive high school that fully integrated the vocational program into its general high school curriculum. Bayonne's vocational-education program, which has been widely praised, allows vocational students *487 to participate fully in school activities and attend many classes with general education high school students.

In 1972, the Board of Education of the Hudson County Vocational School (hereafter "HCVS" or "county vocational school") passed a resolution authorizing the acquisition of a building for a new county vocational school. The following year, a $2 million budget was proposed for the operation of HCVS, and in 1974 HCVS began operating from its own facility. Realizing that the Bayonne vocational program, by that time in existence more than forty years, would not be discontinued, and wanting to spare Bayonne the double expense of supporting its own and the county's vocational programs, State legislators from Hudson County proposed legislation exempting Bayonne from contributing to the maintenance of the county vocational school.

The terms of the original legislation, proposed as Senate Bill 74 in the 1972 Legislative Session, were quite broad. Those terms provided that

each municipality included within a school district maintaining a system of vocational education approved for the purposes of Federal or State Allotment of vocational funds by the Commissioner of Education under the regulations of the State Board of Education shall be exempt from assessment, levy or collection of taxes based on any apportionment of amounts appropriated for the use of a county vocational school district.

The effect of the original legislation would have exempted virtually every municipality with a vocational-education program from contributing to the support of its county's vocational school. Recognizing that, Senate Education Committee amendments to Senate Bill 74 significantly narrowed the scope of the exemption in order to exempt only Bayonne from the general obligation to support county vocational-educational programs. That narrowing was achieved by limiting the effect of the legislation in two ways. First, the amendments restricted the municipalities affected only to those in a "county of the first class having a population of not more than 700,000 according to the 1970 Federal Census." L. 1973, c. 305, § 1. In 1973, N.J.S.A. 40A:6-1 defined a first class county as "a county having a population of more than 600,000." By that criterion, Bergen County (1970 population 897,148), Essex *488 County (1970 population 932,526), and Hudson County (1970 population 607,839) qualified as first class counties. Only Hudson, however, met the amended statute's population requirement for the tax exemption.

Second, the amendments required that in order for a municipality to qualify for the exemption, its vocational program would have to have been in existence, as a program approved by the State Board of Education for state or federal funding, for at least twenty years. Because, among the Hudson County municipalities, only Bayonne had a vocational education program in existence and approved by the State for at least twenty years, the amended statute applied only to Bayonne. The statement to the bill, from the Senate Education Committee, left no doubt about the intent of the legislation: "This bill, as amended, would exempt the City of Bayonne from any assessment of taxes due to the cost of supporting the county vocational school in Hudson County."

When the 1980 census revealed a reduction in Hudson County's population to 556,972, thereby jeopardizing its first-class status, the Legislature, by L. 1981 c. 462, § 44, established population density as a new criterion and amended N.J.S.A. 40A:6-1 to redefine counties of the first class as "counties having a population of more than 550,000 and a population density of more than 3,000 persons per square mile." Under that reclassification, Hudson County, with a density of 12,801.1 residents per square mile, retained its status as a county of the first class. At the same time, the Legislature, by L. 1981, c. 462, § 20, amended N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 to substitute "latest federal decennial census" for "1970 federal census." Consequently, Bayonne remained the sole New Jersey municipality exempt from county-vocational-school tax payments.

The exemption statute, N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37, now reads:

Notwithstanding any of the provisions of chapter 54 of Title 18A of the New Jersey Statutes, in any county of the first class having a population of not more than 700,000 according to the latest decennial census, each municipality included within a school district which has maintained for a minimum of 20 years a vocational educational program approved for the purposes of federal or State allotment of vocational funds by the Commissioner under the regulation of the State Board of Education shall be exempt from assessment, levy or collection of taxes based on *489 any apportionment of amounts appropriated for the use of a county vocational school district.

To implement the mandate of N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37, Hudson County devised a two-tier tax system for assessing the county tax burden on its municipalities. The system, administered by defendant Hudson County Board of Taxation (HCBT), provided a higher rate (which included the costs of operating the county vocational school) for eleven of Hudson County's twelve municipalities, including plaintiff, Secaucus, and a lower rate (which excluded the costs of operating the county vocational school) for Bayonne. The dual rate was necessary because appropriations for county vocational education must be assessed, levied, and collected in the same manner as general county appropriations pursuant to N.J.S.A. 18A:54-29.2. Lacking any statutory authorization, HCBT could not separate the county vocational-school component from the common purpose budgetary requirements of the county. Under the two-tier system, the other eleven Hudson County municipalities, by paying proportionally more tax than Bayonne, compensated for the revenue lost through Bayonne's exemption from the cost of maintaining HCVS. As the Appellate Division noted: "Put more bluntly, and more precisely, Hudson County struck two county tax rates for its municipalities, the lower one solely for Bayonne." 255 N.J. Super. at 668, 605 A.2d 1151.

The two-tier system of taxation, however, operated not only in the assessment of regular county taxes but also in the determination of what each Hudson County municipality had to pay in added and omitted assessments. As the trial court in the litigation below explained:

On February 15, each year, municipalities must also pay to the county a share of the revenues derived pursuant to N.J.S.A. 54:4-63.1, et seq., (added assessments of real estate), N.J.S.A. 54:4-63.12, et seq., and N.J.S.A. 54:4-63.31, et seq., (omitted assessments of real estate). These provisions prevent new properties constructed after the October 1 assessment date, or properties which were not included in the regular assessment list of October 1 for the tax year, from escaping taxation until the following year. Under N.J.S.A. 54:4-63.19, -63.38, the added or omitted property assessment list is multiplied by the county rate to calculate the sums due to the county for added and omitted taxes.

*490 [Secaucus v. Hudson County Bd. of Taxation, No. 094204-86W (Law Div. June 29, 1990).]

By applying its two-tier system of taxation to the added-and-omitted assessments list, HCBT afforded Bayonne the benefit of a lower rate, while imposing on the other Hudson County municipalities a higher rate. Exacerbating the perception of unfairness in the two-tier tax system was the fact that the revenues generated by the added and omitted assessments were applied only to general county operating expenses and were not separately allocated to HCVS.

Accordingly, on October 17, 1986, Secaucus, as one of the eleven Hudson County municipalities subjected to the higher tax rate, brought a complaint in lieu of prerogative writs against Hudson County and HCBT. Secaucus initially challenged only the methodology by which HCBT calculated the two rates. Secaucus sought to have the county vocational school component excluded from the added and omitted assessments. By leave of the Appellate Division, Secaucus subsequently amended its complaint to include the claim that N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 was unconstitutional as violating the special-legislation and uniformity provisions of the State Constitution. Bayonne was included as a necessary party.

Finding the effect of N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 to be clearly discriminatory, the trial court ordered HCBT to adopt a single county tax rate, to debit Bayonne for its underpayment of county taxes, and to credit the eleven other municipalities for excess payments. On the constitutional claims, the trial court determined that N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 violated both the uniformity clause of the New Jersey Constitution, article VIII, section 1, paragraph 1, and the special-legislation prohibition of article IV, paragraph 9, section 6. The trial court found a violation of the uniformity clause because N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 granted a tax exemption to Bayonne based on the mere incidence of location, rather than on the use of its property. Applying the three-step special-legislation analysis of Vreeland v. Byrne, 72 N.J. 292, 300-01, 370 A.2d 825 (1977), the trial court also found the statute to be special legislation.

*491 On August 31, 1990, this Court Ordered HCBT to comply with the trial court judgment requiring a single 1990 tax rate among all Hudson County municipalities, but stayed that part of the judgment requiring HCBT to credit and debit the Hudson County municipalities for prior years' payments under the two-tier tax system. The single Hudson County tax rate now in effect was computed for the 1990 tax year, pursuant to the Court's order.

The Appellate Division agreed with the trial court that N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 violated the uniformity clause. The Appellate Division, however, applied an entirely different rationale. In its view, the lack of uniformity was caused "by excusing a taxpayer (Bayonne) from having to pay its proportionate share of the cost of an item in the budget of the taxing district (Hudson County)." 255 N.J. Super. at 669, 605 A.2d 1151. Because the uniformity clause requires that all real property "be taxed at the general rate of the taxing district in which the property is situated, for the use of such taxing district," the Appellate Division found that a uniform county tax rate as among the municipalities of a county is mandated by article VIII, section 1, paragraph 1. Id. at 668-69, 605 A.2d 1151. Having found N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 unconstitutional under the uniformity clause, the Appellate Division did not reach the special legislation question.

II

A.

We now consider whether N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 is unconstitutional because it is special legislation or because it violates the uniformity clause under the New Jersey Constitution. In answering the constitutional question, we consider as a preliminary matter two issues: the standing of HCBT to address the constitutionality of the exemption statute and the standard for reviewing claims challenging the constitutionality of legislation.

Secaucus claims that HCBT lacks standing to urge the constitutionality of N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37. That to have standing a *492 party must have "a sufficient stake and real adverseness with respect to the subject matter of the litigation" is well settled. N.J. Chamber of Commerce v. N.J. Election Law Enforcement Commission, 82 N.J. 57, 67, 411 A.2d 168 (1980). Additionally, "[a] substantial likelihood of some harm visited upon the plaintiff in the event of an unfavorable decision is needed for the purposes of standing." Ibid. By those criteria, HCBT clearly has standing. Indeed, HCBT's present position is not unlike that of the Bergen County Board of Taxation in Township of Mahwah v. Bergen County Bd. of Taxation, 98 N.J. 268, 486 A.2d 818, cert. denied sub nom. Borough of Demarest v. Township of Mahwah, 471 U.S. 1136, 105 S.Ct. 2677, 86 L.Ed.2d 696 (1985). In that case, the Court heard the Bergen County Board of Taxation's cross-appeal on the constitutionality of county tax rebate statutes. Like the situation in Mahwah, the decision here will affect how the county tax board calculates the municipalities' apportioned share of county taxes. County boards of taxation are regarded as state agencies with the jurisdiction, authority, and responsibility over county taxes. N.J.S.A. 54:3-11; see DeFeo v. Smith, 17 N.J. 183, 188, 110 A.2d 553 (1955). As a state agency, HCBT will be affected by the determination of the constitutionality of the statute it is charged with enforcing. Significantly, HCBT has been involved in every step of this litigation, having been named by Secaucus as a defendant in both the original and amended complaints. Accordingly, we hold that HCBT has standing to be heard.

With respect to the standard for reviewing the constitutionality of State statutes, the Court will afford every possible presumption in favor of an act of the Legislature. Holster v. Board of Trustees of Passaic County College, 59 N.J. 60, 66, 279 A.2d 798 (1971). Where alternative interpretations of a statute are equally plausible, the view sustaining the statute's constitutionality is favored. David v. Vesta Co., 45 N.J. 301, 212 A.2d 345 (1965); In re Loch Arbor, 25 N.J. 258, 135 A.2d 663 (1957); see Edgewater Inv. Assocs. v. Borough of Edgewater, 103 N.J. 227, 510 A.2d 1178 (1986). Only a statute "clearly repugnant to the constitution" will *493 be declared void. Newark Superior Officers Ass'n v. City of Newark, 98 N.J. 212, 222-23, 486 A.2d 305 (1985).

Further, in the field of taxation, the Court has accorded great deference to legislative judgments. McKenny v. Byrne, 82 N.J. 304, 314, 412 A.2d 1041 (1980). The Court has recognized that absolute equality in taxation is a practical impossibility, Borough of Totowa v. Passaic County Board of Taxation, 5 N.J. 454, 464, 75 A.2d 874 (1950), and that absolute mathematical precision is not required. Murnick v. Asbury Park, 95 N.J. 452, 471 A.2d 1196 (1984). Additionally, in constitutional challenges based on the special-legislation prohibition of article IV, "the burden is on the party challenging the constitutionality of the statute to demonstrate clearly that it violates a constitutional provision." Mahwah, supra, 98 N.J. at 283, 486 A.2d 818.

No statute, however, can authorize an unconstitutional practice. Township of West Milford v. Van Decker, 120 N.J. 354, 357, 576 A.2d 881 (1990). Wherever a statute and the constitution come into conflict, the statute must give way. Id. at 364, 576 A.2d 881.

Accordingly, we must examine N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 to see if it clearly and irremediably violates the constitutional provisions prohibiting special legislation, art. IV, § 7, ¶ 9, and mandating uniformity of taxation of real property within a taxing district, art. VIII, § 1, ¶ 1.

B.

The New Jersey Constitution provides that:

9. The Legislature shall not pass any private, special or local laws:

* * * * * * * *

(6) Relating to taxation or exemption therefrom. [N.J. Const. art. IV, § 7, ¶ 9(6).]

As Justice Garibaldi observed in Town of Morristown v. Woman's Club, "the guiding principles of taxation as embodied in the constitution, requir[e] that taxation of all real property be imposed only by uniform rules and exemption be accomplished only by *494 general laws." 124 N.J. 605, 612, 592 A.2d 216 (1991). Town of Morristown involved only a challenge under the uniformity provision of article VIII. We need not resolve whether the "general law" requirement of article VIII and the prohibition on special legislation of article IV are functionally identical for the purposes of tax laws challenged as special legislation. Whatever the case, the second principle that Justice Garibaldi enunciated is relevant to an article IV special-legislation analysis, i.e., exemptions to taxation shall be accomplished only by general laws.

The concept of special legislation "has been well established in this state for almost a century." Town of Morristown, supra, 124 N.J. at 622, 592 A.2d 216 (Clifford, J., dissenting). From a constitutional standpoint, a law is regarded as special legislation "`when, by force of an inherent limitation, it arbitrarily separates some persons, places or things from others upon which, but for such limitation, it would operate. The test of a special law is the appropriateness of its provisions to the objects that it excludes.'" Ibid. (quoting Budd v. Hancock, 66 N.J.L. 133, 135, 48 A. 1023 (Sup.Ct. 1901)); see Kimball Hosp. v. Brick Township Hosp., 86 N.J. 429, 446, 432 A.2d 36 (1981).

In Vreeland v. Byrne, the Court established a three-part test to determine whether a statute constituted special legislation. As Justice Mountain described it:

[T]he method of analysis is this: we first discern the purpose and object of the enactment. We then undertake to apply it to the factual situation presented. Finally we decide whether, as so applied, the resulting classification can be said to rest upon any rational or reasonable basis relevant to the purpose and object of the act.

[72 N.J. at 300-01, 370 A.2d 825 (emphasis added).]

Accordingly, we must first discern the purpose of N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37; then apply that purpose to the specific facts of the case before us — the support of municipal and county vocational schools; and finally, decide whether N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37, as it actually operates, represents a reasonable legislative classification.

In seeking a rational purpose for a statute under constitutional challenge, "the court is not limited to the stated purpose of *495 the legislation, but should seek any conceivable rationale basis." Mahwah, supra, 98 N.J. at 286, 486 A.2d 818. Taken in a light most favorable to the constitutionality of the statute, two possible interpretations of N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 on their face reveal a legitimate legislative purpose. First, N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 may be conceived most generally as a tax relief statute designed to lessen the burden on those municipalities that maintain their own vocational education programs. On that view, the object of N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 is to address the problem of double contribution by municipalities that have their own vocational programs to both a local vocational program and a county vocational program. Under that interpretation, N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 could be analogized to programs like county health services, N.J.S.A. 18A:54-11, or county library services, N.J.S.A. 40:33-9, that address the problem of dual contributions by providing optional funding systems.

A second purpose of N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 may be to promote the development of local, high-quality vocational educational programs within densely-populated communities. In achieving that objective, the statute would have the added benefit of reducing the strain on county vocational schools.

After careful scrutiny of the specific facts of this case and the statute under challenge, how N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 realizes either of those purposes is difficult to see.

In the first case, if alleviating the problem of double contribution for municipalities that maintain their own vocational programs is the real purpose of N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37, the population-density and longevity requirements of the statute make little sense. At least twenty municipalities within the state, and at least one other municipality within Hudson County (Kearny), maintain their own vocational-education programs. As Secaucus noted, to the extent that the burden from double contribution is not any less for municipalities that have maintained local vocational programs for fewer than twenty years, the longevity requirement of N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 seems particularly ill-suited to the goal of tax relief.

*496 In the second case, if the goal of N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 is to encourage the development of high-quality vocational-education programs within densely-populated municipalities, thereby reducing the strain on county vocational schools, to exclude municipalities either in the most-populous counties, i.e. Essex and Bergen, or in less but densely-populated counties like Union and Middlesex, does not seem reasonable. Nonetheless, the statute excludes Essex and Bergen on the basis of their excessive populations (over 700,000), and excludes densely-populated Union and Middlesex counties because they are not designated first-class counties.

That "[a] classification based on population does not automatically render a law unconstitutional special legislation" is well settled. Newark Superior Officers Ass'n, supra, 98 N.J. at 225, 486 A.2d 305. This Court has recognized the rational "nexus between accountability and population." Id. at 225-26, 486 A.2d 305 (citing and explaining cases in which the Court has upheld population classifications as rationally related to a legitimate legislative purpose); see also Mahwah, supra, 98 N.J. at 288-90, 486 A.2d 818 (citing and explaining cases in which Court has upheld population requirement against special-legislation challenges).

In Mahwah, supra, the Court considered a special legislation challenge to N.J.S.A. 54:4-5 (hereafter "the rebate statute") and what was then N.J.S.A. 54-4-5.2 (hereafter "the supplemental statute"). 98 N.J. at 271, 486 A.2d 818. The rebate statute, originally enacted in 1922,

provided a rebate of a portion of a municipality's share of county taxes if the municipality were located in a first-class county with a population in excess of 800,000 and had within its borders 200 acres or more of land used and occupied by a state or county institution.

[Ibid.]

The purpose and effect of the rebate statute was to reduce the burden imposed upon Cedar Grove, which acted as host municipality to the Essex county psychiatric hospital "without receiving any corresponding tax benefit." Id. at 275, 486 A.2d 818. In 1980, the Legislature had passed a supplemental statute that imposed a *497 "grandfather clause" on the rebate statute's benefits. By the terms of the supplemental statute, only those municipalities that had qualified for the rebate statute prior to September 1980 could come within the scope of the rebate statute. Id. at 293, 486 A.2d 818. The effect of the supplemental statute was to guarantee that Cedar Grove would remain "the only municipality to ever qualify for the rebate." Ibid.

The Court declined to find that the rebate statute was unconstitutional special legislation based merely on the rebate statute's population requirements. Id. at 290, 486 A.2d 818. Observing that common sense dictated that "an institution (like a county psychiatric hospital) in a county with a larger population will likely be utilized by more people than a similar institution in a smaller county," ibid., the Court concluded that the costs to the host municipality of such an institution would be greater in a larger than in a smaller county. Accordingly, the Court found the population classification to have a reasonable basis.

In this case, we are cognizant of the fact that Hudson County is unique in terms of the density and urbanization of its population, having almost twice as many residents per square mile (12,108.1) as the next most densely-populated county, Essex County (6,701.7). From that fact, it is possible to conjecture that the Legislature had a special interest in encouraging the development of local vocational education programs in the State's most densely populated areas. Nevertheless, that possibility seems remote, if not illusory. That concern has never been advanced as a possible legislative purpose or concern. Further, from the perspective of making educational services available to as many students as feasible, the encouragement of excellent vocational schools by individual school districts would make as much sense for less densely-populated areas as those more densely-populated. However, as already noted, the particular limitations embodied in N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 go well beyond population size and density.

The requirement that the local vocational program be in operation for at least twenty years — the so-called "longevity" requirement *498 — works to exclude other municipalities, in areas just as densely populated as Bayonne, from the benefit of the statute. To accept the classifications contained in N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 as having a rational basis, one must imagine that the Legislature had some reasonable ground for encouraging the development of local vocational programs only in the most-densely-populated county in the state with a total population below 700,000, and that the Legislature had reasonable grounds for concluding that only those programs in existence for at least twenty years were of sufficient quality to be worthy of financial encouragement through tax relief. Those conclusions seem to us to stretch credulity beyond reasonable limits.

The dissent finds the statute rational because it pursues a very different mode of analysis of the classifications embodied in the statute. First, the dissent disaggregates the population and longevity requirements. With respect to the twenty-year approval requirement, the dissent simply refuses to "second-guess" the legislature and finds the longevity requirement rational. Post at 513, 628 A.2d at 304. The dissent then finds the population requirements, if not rational, at least harmless because "[t]he list of approved vocational programs reveals that no municipality either in Bergen or Essex Counties maintains such a program." Post at 514, 628 A.2d at 304.

It is important to keep in mind, however, that when the dissent refers to "such" programs, it means approved vocational-education programs in existence for at least twenty years. Under the longevity term of the statute, a school district is required to have "maintained for a minimum of 20 years a vocational educational program approved for the purposes of federal or State allotment of vocational funds by the Commissioner of Education." N.J.S.A. 18A54-37 (emphasis added). As recognized by the Appellate Division, "almost every local school district has an approved education program." 255 N.J. Super. at 667, 605 A.2d 1151. In turn, almost every municipality in the state maintains a vocational-education program approved for the purposes of federal aid under N.J.A.C. 6:43-2. Were the population ceiling (700,000) to be excised from the statute, those municipalities in Bergen and Essex *499 counties would still not qualify under the statute's classifications because their vocational-education programs have been in existence for less than twenty years.

When the dissent thus says that no municipalities in Bergen or Essex counties maintain "such" approved programs, what it means is that all approved vocational-education programs within those counties are excluded by the statute's longevity requirement. That is precisely the point. The interaction of the longevity and population requirements irrationally restricts the statute's classifications to exclude municipalities that, on any reasonable analysis, ought to come within the statute's purview.

An analysis of the history of N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 further undermines the plausibility of interpreting the statute as a legitimate attempt to encourage local vocational programs in densely-populated areas.

Ordinarily, the fact that N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 was enacted more than twenty years ago and amended by the Legislature in 1981 would create a strong presumption in favor of its constitutionality. Mahwah, supra, 98 N.J. at 291, 486 A.2d 818. In the instant case, however, a careful examination of the legislative history of N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 and the circumstances of its amendment in 1981, only reinforce the perception that the statute constitutes special legislation.

As noted earlier, supra at 487, 628 A.2d at 290, the original terms of what became N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 would have achieved the broad and entirely rational purpose of tax relief for all those municipalities that operated their own vocational-education programs. The bill was amended, however, to be directed toward a class of one: Bayonne. The special nature of the legislation was recognized by the Senate Education Committee itself, which described the legislation as a bill to "exempt the City of Bayonne from any assessment of taxes due to the cost of supporting the county vocational school in Hudson County." supra at 488, 628 A.2d at 291 (emphasis added).

When, in 1981, the population of Hudson County fell below 600,000, thus jeopardizing its status as a county of the first class, *500 the Legislature responded by redefining county of the first class with new total population and population-density requirements. The population-density requirement had the effect of keeping Middlesex County, which by 1980 had a population larger than that of Hudson County, from becoming a county of the first class. At the same time it redefined a first-class county, the Legislature amended N.J.S.A. 18A:54-37 so that its population ceiling of 700,000 would track the most recent decennial census. The effect of those amendments was to continue to guarantee that only Bayonne would derive the benefit of the statute's exemption.

True, a statute is not unconstitutional as special legislation merely because its effect is limited