Extend Key Property Tax Reform – Earn the Respect We Claim to Seek.

By Assemblyman Declan O’Scanlon

When Gov. Christie came to office in 2010, he took action to address the biggest problem New Jerseyans have faced for decades – property taxes. Working with the Legislature, historic tax reforms were signed into law. These included a two percent limit on property tax levies, increased health and pension contributions by public employees and a two percent cap on awards arbitrators can grant when towns and their unions can’t agree on a contract.

These cost control tools are working. Recent property tax data shows the average property tax bill grew by 1.7 percent in 2013 and by the lowest consistent rate in decades since the reforms were passed. While our ultimate goal is to actually cut property taxes, slowing their growth is an essential first step.

The clock is now counting down to the destruction of the delicate framework that has successfully controlled our property taxes.  An essential component of that framework – the arbitration award cap which enables local officials to control their largest costs – expired on April 1 of this year.  The first contracts exempt from the cap will expire in June. That will be a disaster for property taxpayers throughout New Jersey. Without an honest and effective arbitration award cap, the property tax cap will fail.

The state’s interest arbitration cap law is one of the primary reasons we have turned the tide on the escalation of property taxes. According to the Public Employment Relations Commission, from January 2011 (when the arbitration law took effect) to September 2013, average raises in local contracts, whether through arbitration or negotiations, were 1.86 percent — the lowest in at least 20 years.

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Middletown Calls On Christie, Legislature To Allow Affordable Housing Funds To Assist Sandy Impacted Homeowners

Citing the shortage of federal and state funds available to assist Superstorm Sandy impacted homeowners in rebuilding their homes, the Middletown Township Committtee this week joined Marlboro Mayor Jonathan Hornik and Assemblyman Declan O’Scanlon in calling on the state legislature and Governor Chris Christie to put the more than $100 million in Affordable Housing Funds that are sitting dormant to work.

With a unanimous 5-0 vote, the committee passed a resolution on Monday, April 21, calling for legislation that would reinstate Regional Contribution Agreements (RCAs) “for the limited purpose of getting victims of Superstorm Sandy back in their homes during this time of need.”

RCAs were created in the original 1985 Fair Housing Act whereby towns with funds raised from developer fees or through bonding could transfer up to half of those funds to another community for the purpose of building affordable housing as required by the New Jersey Supreme Court’s Mt. Laurel decision.

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The Politics Of Disaster Relief

By Art Gallagher, [email protected]

When disaster hits, natural or man made, Americans put aside their differences and come together to handle the emergency.

We saw it with 9-11. Most recently in New Jersey we saw it with Superstorm Sandy.

Once the emergency is over and the federal money is flowing, the politics…partisanship and patronage starts.  We saw it with 9-11. We’re living it with Sandy.

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Reacting to Christie, NJ lawyers call for constitutional amendment to protect judges

Reacting to Christie, NJ lawyers call for constitutional amendment to protect judges (via NJ.com)

TRENTON — New Jersey’s largest group of lawyers today called for a rewrite in the state constitution that would strengthen job security for the state’s judges and Supreme Court justices. After seeing Gov. Chris Christie deny reappointment to two Supreme…

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Quinnipiac Poll: New Jersey Voters Approve Of Christie More Than Obama, Menendez or Booker

New Jersey Voters Disapprove of the State Legislature, 36-48%

By Art Gallagher, [email protected]

Governor Chris Christie at Belmar Town Hall. photo by Art Gallagher

A Quinnipiac Poll released this morning indicates that, despite the beating he has been taking in the local and national media since January, Governor Chris Christie has higher approval ratings than President Barack Obama, Senator Bob Menendez and Senator Cory Booker, among New Jersey voters.

Quinnipiac didn’t spin the poll that way in their narrative, but that is what the numbers indicate.  Most of the media coverage about this poll will be negative for Christie. Too many reporters and editors read the spin and not the numbers.

There is bad news for Christie in this poll.  His approval rating has dropped to 49-44% since January when it was 55-38%.

82% of Republicans and 54% of Independents approve of Christie’s job performance. Only 23% of Democrats give the Guv love.

The Governor’s bully rating is higher than ever before. Voters are now evenly split 48-48 on whether he’s a leader or a bully. In January they said he was more of a leader by 54-40 margin.

56% of voters think the Mastro Report, the internal investigation commissioned by the Governor’s Office that exonerated Christie from any involvement in the Bridgegate scandal was a “whitewash.”  Voters are split 46-46 over whether the legislative investigation into Bridgegate lead by Assemblyman John Wisniewski and Senator Loretta Weinberg is a legitimate investigation or a political witch-hunt.

Voters have a net negative impression of the State Legislature that crosses all party lines. Republicans disapprove of legislature 40-45, Democrats 40-43 and Independents 33-53.  The Legislature’s overall approval numbers are negative 36-48.

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O’Scanlon Calls On Towns To File For Arbitration Before April 1

With one business day to go prior to the expiration of the Interest Arbitration Award Cap that has saved New Jersey property tax payers millions of dollars over the last 3 years, and with no sign that Assembly Speaker Vincent Prieto is going to call the General Assembly back into session to vote on concurring with Governor Chris Chrisite’s conditional veto of legislation to extend the cap, Assemblyman Declan O’Scanlon, R-Monmouth, the Republican Assembly Budget Officer, is calling on every New Jersey municipality with an expired police or firefighters contract to file for arbitration on Monday so their new contract will fall within the 2% parameter of the existing cap.

“It is quite frankly heart breaking to me that the leadership of my house, all of who are my friends, are leading New Jersey property tax payers off a cliff,” O’Scanlon said, “I fully expected to hear by the end of the day today that we would be brought back to Trenton on Monday to vote to affirm the Governor’s conditional veto of the arbitration award cap legislation which was overwhelmingly passed on a bipartisan measure by the apparently much more responsible New Jersey State Senate.

“Since the clock is counting down to the expiration of the previous law and the Assembly leadership seems to care more about pandering to special interest than the property tax payers of New Jersey I now feel compelled to take action assuming we’ll face the worst case scenario. In order to most comprehensively guard themselves against potential frivolous, but costly none the less, litigation any municipality that has an expired contract, but that has not yet filed for arbitration, should do so immediately – before the April 1 expiration of the previous law.

“It is extremely unfortunate that the Assembly Democrat leadership would act to threaten the welfare of New Jersey property tax payers, but that is apparently the reality.”

Pass this post on to your municipal officials.

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Still Hope For Property Tax Cap

The ball is in the Assembly’s court

Both the State Senate and General Assembly passed the bill that would blow a hole in municipal budgets for the next four years, the “extension” of the 2% Interest Arbitration Cap for police and firefighters base salaries that did not really cap those salaries.  Had the bill become law, there would have been a massive cut in municipal services throughout New Jersey or property taxes would have started rising again at levels we experienced during the Corzine/Codey/McGreevey administrations.

But Governor Chris Christie conditionally vetoed the bill and the Senate quickly concurred with the changes he made to the bill which kept the cap intact through December 2017 by a vote of 33-1.   Christie’s office announced the conditional veto and the Senate’s concurrence in the same press release.

One has to wonder why the Senate went through the exercise of passing the “bad bill” in the first place, by a vote of 28-7, only to abandon the changes it made to the existing Interest Arbitration Cap and, for the most part, extend the existing law for another four years, so quickly.   Without the Senate’s concurrence to Christie’s conditional veto, the cap on arbitration awards would expire on April 1st.  Either the “bad bill” or the expiration of the cap would have been a victory for the Trenton Democrats benefactors in the police and firefighters unions.

The unions may still have their victory.  Before the Assembly could take a vote on concurring with Christie’s conditional veto, Speaker Vincent Prieto abruptly adjourned the session.   No Assembly session has been scheduled, yet, to take up the concurrence prior to April 1.

Below is a video of Assemblyman Declan O’Scanlon’s floor speak before the chamber voted on the “bad bill.”   As usual, O’Scanlon makes is case and fights for New Jersey taxpayers very well.

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NJ Senator Mike Doherty Pulls A Pelosi

Sponsors a critical bill before he reads it

Legislature in poised to pass a “cap” that doesn’t control costs

State Senator Mike Doherty

State Senator Mike Doherty (R-Warren) told MMM that he hadn’t read a bill of which is he is a primary sponsor, the day after it cleared the Senate State Government, Wagering, Tourism and Historic Preservation Committee.

We’re not talking about an insignificant bill like designating “I’m from New Jersey” as the State Song, or the establishment of special license plates for honorably discharged veterans, two other bills that Doherty sponsored.

We’re talking about the extension of the 2% cap on arbitration awards for police and firefighters unions, the provision of the 2010 reform legislation that slowed the growth in New Jersey’s property taxes and made the 2% cap on those taxes work.

Doherty joined Senate President Sweeney in sponsoring legislation that exempts contracts that have already been subject to the cap from being subject to it again when they are up for renewal and raises the cap to 3% on contracts that have not yet been subject to renegotiation.

Doherty said, “I don’t see what the big deal is, the original bill had one bite at the apple, this bill extends that.  Is it a perfect bill? No, but this is the way Trenton works. A bill that passes is better than no bill.”

Not really, Senator.  A bill that passes the same as no bill, except it deceives the public into thinking the legislature is continuing fiscal reforms when they are actually engineering massive chaos in municipal governments.

Doherty said he hadn’t read the bill when we questioned him on specifics.  He said he was relying on analysis of the bill from Republican legislative staffers and referred questions to Republican Senators Steven Oroho and Sam Thompson, members of the committee that unanimously cleared the bill.

The leadership of the police and firefighters unions not only read the bill, they helped write it, according to what they are telling their members.

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Property taxes: Christie won’t sign Democrat bill to extend key law, Republican lawmaker says

Property taxes: Christie won’t sign Democrat bill to extend key law, Republican lawmaker says (via NJ.com)

TRENTON — A fight over renewing a law crucial to holding back an increase in property taxes is nowhere near resolved, a Republican lawmaker who has led the fight for retaining it said today. Although the Democrat-led Legislature last week began advancing…

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The Dismantling Of Christie’s “Bi-partisan” Reforms

photo credit: Tim Larsen/Governor’s Office

It’s beginning to look like Governor Chris Christie’s Boulevard of Compromise is a dead end.

The 2% property tax cap is under attack, as the Trenton Democrats are on the verge of passing an “extension” of the Interest Arbitration Award Cap that eliminates the cap on most arbitration awards and increases the cap on the remainder of the potential awards by 50%.

In my piece last night about the Interest Arbitration Cap, I raised the hope that published reports that Assembly and Senate committees cleared an identical bill that guts the cap were inaccurate because Senator Mike Doherty was co-sponsor of the Senate bill and because of Senate President Steve Sweeney’s comments about the cap at his Town Hall Meeting in Keansburg last week.  It turns out that was wishful thinking. MMM has learned the bills are identical and, inexplicably, Doherty is a primary sponsor of the Senate bill, giving Sweeney and Assembly Speaker Vincent Prieto “bi-partisan” cover.

Doherty has yet to return our call for comment.  We’ve been told his attitude about the bill he is sponsoring with Sweeney is “a bill that will pass is better than no bill.”

Doherty has a point, albeit a minor one.  If no bill passes by April 1, there is no cap on Interest Arbitration awards at all.  If the bill that cleared through committees yesterday passes the full legislature and is signed by Christie, there will be a 3% cap on a minority of municipal government labor contracts for the next few years.  If Christie vetoes the bill, even conditionally, there is no arbitration cap.  Either way the property tax blaze is about to be reignited and/or the pain inflicted upon municipalities will be so great that consolidations and mergers will be forced indelicately.  The backdoor destruction of municipal governments appears to be Sweeney’s undeclared plan.

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