Over the last several weeks, we’ve seen disturbing contradictions emerge since Governor Christie unveiled his proposed budget for the upcoming fiscal year. In one of the defining moments of his budget address, he noted, “mark my words, if a tax increase is sent to my desk I will veto it.”
Let’s not be confused – a tax increase by any other name, is still just that, a tax increase. Sadly, the tax increases proposed this year are not the more obvious ones that the Governor has railed against, like the Millionaire’s Tax. In this case they are less obvious taxes that affect a disproportionate number of the middle class and working poor.
When Governor Christie signed three landmark public employee pension reforms into law late Monday evening, lawmakers should have known the job was only half over. In retrospect, passing these reforms in the first place may have been the easy part, as lawmakers’ offices have quickly become inundated with phone calls and e-mails from nervous employees unsure of what these changes mean to them and their families.
To try to reach out to every single public employee would be a nearly impossibly task. Hopefully, answering these frequently asked questions will not only put their minds at ease, but ensure all residents understand why this action was needed.
When Governor Chris Christie recently proposed cutting unemployment benefits by up to $50 per week and delaying an increase in the amount businesses contribute to the system, it would be easy to think yet another issue would break down simply along the lines of Democrat versus Republican.
Frankly, as a Democrat, my first instinct was to oppose the Governor’s plan. The jobless and their families need every penny to stay above water – and as one of only three states where employees pay into the Unemployment Insurance (UI) Trust Fund, workers who lose their jobs deserve every cent they put into the system while they were working. And preventing money from flowing into the UI fund is every bit as dangerous to its long-term health as the past raids that left it on life support.
When the Senate voted last week to reform New Jersey’s public employee pension and benefits system, it was under the glaring watch of a visitors’ gallery packed with angry state workers. Hundreds more lined the halls of the Statehouse, shouting their disapproval so that it was impossible not to hear them.
State worker unions are angry and they are doing all they can to drum up that anger through the ranks. Unfortunately, their campaign has been built on distortions and misinformation.
Trying to tackle pension and benefits reform in Trenton is a lot like playing the game “telephone.” Every time new proposals are introduced, the message gets lost in translation; mischaracterizations lead to fear and ultimately to resistance.
We’ve now reached a precipice; the luxury of time has flown out the window. The system, which is one of the largest drivers of local property taxes, is about to collapse under its own weight and taxpayers can no longer afford to prop it up.
For many people, owning a home is the great American dream, but in New Jersey, thanks to over-zealous and impractical Council on Affordable Housing (COAH) regulations, that dream quickly becomes a nightmare for first-time homebuyers seeking to find affordable housing in the Garden State.
While the main goal of COAH –affordable housing for all, irrespective of annual income – remains laudable, COAH’s mandates have for more than 20 years stalled development, centralized poverty in many of our aging urban centers, and contributed to higher costs of living and declining quality of life in New Jersey.
We all have heroes; we just define them in different ways.
There is no question, in life, Detective Marc Anthony DiNardo served his community bravely and selflessly. His daily acts of heroism then, are matched only by his final act of heroism now. His exceptional legacy will endure through the gift of life he so selflessly gave to New Jerseyans waiting for life-saving organs. Through this gracious gift, we hope that his family, friends, colleagues on the police force and the members of his community gain solace and begin to heal.
If you have been watching television over the past few months, chances are you might have seen a commercial by the software giant Microsoft depicting a 4 year-old child clearly demonstrating proficiency in the use of its Windows Live Photo Gallery software. While Microsoft is clearly able to get its implicit marketing message to its intended audience, the greater American public, there are other more austere implications to be considered.
In twenty-first century society, children are introduced to the computer not too long after they are able to walk, and as they grow, are unable to imagine a world without virtual gaming consoles and advanced computing devices that are as central in our daily lives as the television was a quarter century ago. Indeed, most adults now cannot grasp the notion of going through a day without the use of a mobile telephone, a reminder that adults too become enamored and almost completely dependent on these more contemporary devices.
People are frustrated about the growing phenomena of hospital closings and the shutdown of health services. The hospital closure issue has grown from the purchasing of non-profits by for-profits, to large hospital systems shutting down their own facilities/services, to the closure of essential but underfunded hospitals in targeted neighborhoods. The decision makers say they have no choice because revenues continue to decline while costs increase, making financial insolvency is imminent.
The Essex County region is home to a large and growing racially and ethnically diverse population including immigrants, many who are medically underserviced, underinsured or uninsured with limited economic resources. Occasionally state government responds with a short-term, unsustainable bailout, while the few community/consumer leaders who do complain seem primarily interested in the loss of jobs for friends and family. They seldom highlight the loss of health services. Recent professional reports have shown the problems of health care costs are more intricate than advocates and providers are willing to admit.
For many people, owning a home is the great American dream, but in New Jersey, thanks to over-zealous and impractical Council on Affordable Housing (COAH) regulations, that dream quickly becomes a nightmare for first-time homebuyers seeking to find affordable housing in the Garden State.
While the main goal of COAH –affordable housing for all, irrespective of annual income – remains laudable, COAH’s mandates have for more than 20 years stalled development, centralized poverty in many of our aging urban centers, and contributed to higher costs of living and declining quality of life in New Jersey.
COAH can be redeemed, but not by piling new rules and regulations on old, failed policies.
It was bitter medicine, but taxpayers were asked to swallow hard and accept the bipartisan, 700-billion-dollar, financial rescue package as an emergency action by the federal government to save our financial market.
It was a grim setting. Stock prices on Wall Street were plummeting. Home foreclosure signs were springing up everywhere. Senior citizens were terrified by their lost savings and memories of the Great Depression. Credit markets were frozen.
July 28, 2008 marked the two year anniversary of the discovery of mercury at the site of Kiddie Kollege, the Franklin Township daycare center that at one time provided day care services for children ages 8 months to 13 years.
Prior to housing Kiddie Kollege, the building served as the headquarters of Accutherm Inc., a thermometer manufacturer. Kiddie Kollege closed its doors in July of 2006, after the State Departments of Health and Senior Services (DHSS) and Environmental Protection (DEP) deemed the building unsafe and unfit for occupancy.
These findings and the concern of the parents whose children attended the daycare center led me to sponsor S-2261, a law which requires the Department of Health and Senior Services to adopt regulations establishing evaluation and assessment procedures for determining the safety of child care centers and schools.
As the senator who represents Legislative District 4, which includes Franklin Township, I would like to update local residents on the progress of the long-overdue demolition of the Kiddie Kollege building. As of now, the building is slated to be demolished in November of this year.
In addition to the demolition of the building, a few other projects will be taking place on the property, to help ensure that all mercury and other contaminants are fully removed. The DEP has been instructed to safely remove the building’s septic tank and the soil on the property. The DEP will also set up air-monitoring stations around the perimeter of the property, to measure dust particulates and test for mercury vapors.
The ball was dropped on this issue once before when Kiddie Kollege was permitted to open on the site of an old thermometer manufacturer. Common sense should have led all parties involved to check the soil and water for mercury, but that’s just not what happened. It is imperative that we get it right this time. We can’t allow the health of our children and the residents of this area as a whole, to be put in harm’s way because of negligence.
The goal of the criminal justice system is to give offenders a second chance – an opportunity to make amends for their mistakes and move on. We need to believe that offenders can be rehabilitated and transformed from criminals to productive members of society.
Unfortunately, there is still one thing that keeps ex-convicts from fully participating in society— their uncertainty about their eligibility to vote. Former offenders do not always realize that their voting rights are restored after they have finished all jail, probation and parole sentences.
It isn’t really necessary to reiterate how painful a trip to the pump can be for New Jerseyans fueling up their cars. It seems like it was only yesterday when $20 could buy a full tank of gas, at $1.75 a gallon.
With gas at $4 per gallon looming around the corner, it’s past time that New Jersey and the rest of the nation examine the issues surrounding our most recent gas crisis. More than anything, we need to break our addiction to foreign oil and adopt policies that make the most of existing domestic natural resources while cultivating alternative energy for our future energy needs.
I am sure by now that everyone has heard about the incident caught on a camera phone in early July where paramedic trainees at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ) were forced to dress up in white sheets, resembling members of the Ku Klux Klan. The trainees were on clinical rotation under the supervision of UMDNJ EMS workers as part of a certification course at the hospital.
While I am pleased to know that the group of paramedics who were caught on camera forcing the trainees to dress up have all been fired, it is imperative that university officials get to the bottom of what happened.