Joseph Vitale

TRENTON – Legislation sponsored by Senators Barbara Buono and Joseph Vitale that would exempt nonprofit organizations such as the YMCA from having to collect sales taxes on membership fees was approved by the Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee today.

“It was never the intent of the Legislature that non-profit groups would ever have to collect sales taxes,” said Senator Buono, D-Middlesex. “We knew it would place a severe hardship on groups like the YMCA, which look to serve broad communities while keeping their membership fees as low as possible.”

TRENTON – A bill sponsored by Senator Joseph F. Vitale which would give adoptees and certain others access to the adoptee’s original birth certificate and other related family information was approved by the Senate today by a vote of 26-12.

“Adoptees know the importance of the basic information we so often take for granted – information on who we are, and where we’ve come from,” said Senator Vitale, D-Middlesex, the Chairman of the Senate Health, Human Services and Senior Citizens Committee. “With today’s approval, we are one step closer to shedding light on adoptees’ pasts, and giving them the option of exploring some of the most fundamental questions of their birth.”

TRENTON – The Senate today approved a bill to provide “parity” insurance coverage for alcohol addiction and mental health treatment under a bill sponsored by Senators Joseph F. Vitale and Barbara Buono, both D-Middlesex.

The Senate approved the bill 29 to 9 and it now goes to the Assembly.

TRENTON – Legislation sponsored by Senators Barbara Buono and Joseph F. Vitale which would criminalize the harvesting and selling for profit of human remains was approved by the full Senate today by a vote of 39-0.

“We’ve seen perverse cases in recent news of opportunistic people plundering corpses and selling body parts to turn a quick profit,” said Senator Buono, D-Middlesex. “In these cases, after desecrating the corpses, they sell the body parts for transplantation or medical therapy, without any safeguard or proper medical screening. This bill is necessary, to protect patients from receiving unsafe transplantations and to assure families that their deceased loved ones’ corpses will not be desecrated.”

TRENTON – Insurance coverage for alcohol addiction and mental health treatment would be greatly enhanced under a bill approved today by the Senate Budget & Appropriations Committee.

“It’s only right that mental health problems and alcohol and drug addictions be covered in the same manner as other diseases,” said Senator Joseph F. Vitale, a prime sponsor of the bill, S-807.

TRENTON – A bill sponsored by Senators Joseph F. Vitale and Ellen Karcher which would require ambulatory care facilities in New Jersey to provide uncompensated outpatient renal dialysis services for uninsured, low-income people was approved by the Senate Health, Human Services and Senior Citizens Committee today by a vote of 8-0, with 2 abstentions.

“Today in New Jersey, 1.3 million people do not have health insurance,” said Senator Vitale, D-Middlesex, the Chair of the Senate Health, Human Services and Senior Citizens Committee. “Living without the most basic health care coverage can make dealing with even minor medical conditions difficult, and can make complex, expensive procedures like dialysis impossible. We need to give New Jersey’s uninsured a helping hand, and ensure that economic status does not keep New Jerseyans from the health care they so desperately need.”