TRENTON — New Jersey’s pension fund earned 7.3 percent on its investments last year, which state officials said beat market expectations. But those gains didn’t live up to the 7.9 percent annual rate experts say is needed to keep troubled pension fund from adding to its liabilities. The investments returned 7.27 percent, but were hurt largely… Read the rest of this entry »
TRENTON — With some help from a year-end tax amnesty program, New Jersey’s tax collections in the first half of the fiscal year grew beyond the rate required for the state to stay on budget, according to a treasurer’s report released today. Nearly $2.7 billion in lottery, income tax, sales tax and other revenues flowed into… Read the rest of this entry »
State Treasurer Andrew Sidamon-Eristoff testifies before Assembly Budget Committee on Governor Christie’s announcement yesterday to grab $2.43 billion meant for the pension system to balance the state budget. Trenton, NJ 5/21/14 (Tony Kurdzuk/The Star-Ledger)
TRENTON — New Jersey’s revenue, which last month was on track to meet Gov. Chris Christie’s forecasts, has fallen behind the 5.2 percent growth rate built into this year’s budget, according to a new report released today. After November tax collections fell behind the governor’s expectations in a number of areas, the growth rate through the… Read the rest of this entry »
Analysis: Millionaire’s Tax to Close Pension Gap Could Be Headed To Ballot in 2015 (via NJSpotlight)
Gov. Chris Christie vowing to veto any tax increase, Democratic legislative leaders looking for pension-funding solutions may conclude that their best option is to bypass Christie by putting a millionaire’s tax on the ballot as a constitutional amendment…
Christie’s pension plan puts NJ Democrats in a bind as budget deadline looms (via NJ.com)
TRENTON — No one wants to be the politician who guts spending, raises taxes or reneges on a promise. But thanks to Gov. Chris Christie and a sluggish economic recovery in New Jersey, those are the choices facing Democratic leaders in the state Legislature…
A crazy June: Things to look out for in Trenton this month (via NJ.com)
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…
Opinion: Christie’s Available Options Have Gone From Bad to Worse (via NJSpotlight)
Being governor is all about having options, settling on a course of action, marshaling legislative and public support, and then implementing it smoothly and effectively. From time to time, though, issues arise for which none of the available options…
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.
Posted: May 20th, 2014 | Author: Art Gallagher | Filed under: Chris Christie, Christie Administration, New Jersey State Budget, Pensions | Tags: Chris Christie, Governor Chris Christie, NJ State Budget, Pension reform | Comments Off on Governor Christie’s Remarks On Cutting Pension Payments To Balance The Budget
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