Governor Chris Christie is scheduled to be in Keansburg on Monday morning, 10:30am, to make an announcement and give updates on the Homeowners’ Elevation Program.
The event is scheduled to take place at a private residence at 57 Beaconlight Ave.
TRENTON — Hold onto your seats. It’s June in Trenton, and that’s always a bumpy ride. With the state budget due by month’s end, horse-trading is rampant as just about everything that was proposed all year long under the Statehouse dome is up…
Governor Chris Christie has called a press conference for 2:30 this afternoon to announce his new judicial nominations.
The Star Ledgerreported this morning that the governor would re-nominate Chief Justice Stuart Rabner, giving Rabner tenure, and nominate Superior Court Judge Lee Solomon to the Supreme Court. In a deal struck with Senate President Sweeney, there a remaining vacancy on the Supreme Court would continue to be filled on a temporary basis by Rabner’s choice, Judge Mary Catherine Cuff.
Christie’s press conference can be viewed live here:
By Matt Friedman and Salvador Rizzo/The Star-Ledger TRENTON — Gov. Chris Christie today will re-nominate Stuart Rabner as chief justice of the state Supreme Court, The Star-Ledger has learned. The development is a breakthrough in negotiations between…
Governor Christie: I have made the decision that we are not going to blindside our students, we are not going to blindside our seniors, our higher education institutions or those who rely on the safety net the state provides to balance the budget with only six weeks left in the fiscal year. So you have to make choices and we are making them. We’re choosing to be responsible in terms of the way we fund these critical priorities that matter to the people of the state. And we are choosing not put at risk those programs that I mentioned and those services that the people of the state rely upon, especially on such extraordinarily short notice. I’d love to give people tax relief. I’d love to also be able to fund programs that are priorities and that matter a great deal to me and to the people of this state. But until we decide to be adults and deal with the problem we know we have we’re not going to be able to do that. And so today I’m doing what I need to do to fulfill my constitutional obligation to balance a budget. Today I’m going to pledge to make the payments that we need to make to not dig the hole any deeper. But in a time when we’re confronted with this type of challenge I cannot also pay for all the sins of my predecessors, and so we’re going to do this now. We’re going to continue to try to get better as we move forward but you’re going to continue to hear from me and you will hear from me soon with specifics on the way we need to change the pension and the health benefit system. I’ve been saying over the course of the last number of months that come Fiscal Year ’16 New Jersey is going to be paying more for health benefit costs for retirees than we pay for active employees. If there is any greater symbol for how untenable the system has become I don’t know what it is. And so we need to deal with this problem and we need to deal with it directly. I will fix the problems that have been foist upon us today. But I’m going to need cooperation from the Legislature and elected officials across the state to deal with this problem going forward.
TRENTON — Gov. Chris Christie today announced plans to reduce two key payments scheduled for the state’s pension system for public workers — an emergency move that could trigger lawsuits and further downgrades of the state’s credit rating but solves…
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.
Governor Chris Christie will deliver his annual budget address to the legislature at 2pm this afternoon. The address can be viewed via livestream provided by NJTV here:
“A Choice of Attitude” is the theme of Governor Chris Christie’s FY 2015 budget address.
Christie will argue that state government spending as proposed in his budget is $2.2 billion lower than the fiscal 2008 state budget, save for the $2.25 billion pension payment budget for this year. He will call further pension reforms, arguing that the massive obligation to state employees prevents the government from spending on education, university research, energy, the environment and infrastructure. He will argue that pensions and entitlements must be reformed in order to prevent a looming crisis.
Christie says new taxes are not an option.
Excerpts of Christie’s address as released by the Governor’s office is below:
A 5th Balanced Budget Without Raising Taxes That Makes The Largest Pension Payment Ever
“My message to the federal government, get the resources where they are needed as fast as possible, as hard as possible and for the duration. Because the recovery process, obviously in a place like New Jersey is going to take a significant amount of time….
I told the mayors and the governors, if they are getting no for an answer somewhere in the federal government, they can call me personally at the White House.” ~ President Barack Obama, October 30, 2012
“On October 29 last year the job changed for me. It’s no longer a job, it’s a mission.
You see a mission is something that is different from a job. A mission is sacred. It’s a sacred trust that was thrust on me, and you, on October 29 of last year.
And that mission is to make sure that everyone, everyone in New Jersey that was affected by Sandy to return to normalcy in their lives.
I will not let anyone, anything, any governmental entity, or any force get in between me and the completion of my mission.” ~ Governor Chris Christie, November 5, 2013
Welcome back to Monmouth County, Governor Christie. We’ve been waiting for you.
