CALABRO & HARVEY CALL CORZINE’S PLAN FOR HIGHER TAXES AND FEWER STATE WORKERS WILL BE A FINANCIAL DISASTER FOR THE 14TH

CALABRO & HARVEY CALL CORZINE'S PLAN FOR HIGHER TAXES AND FEWER STATE WORKERS WILL BE A FINANCIAL DISASTER
FOR THE 14^TH LEGISLATIVE DISTRICT

GOP CHALLENGERS ASK: ‘CAN CORZINE COUNT

ON GREENSTEIN AND DeANGELO'S VOTE AGAIN?'

For Immediate Release                          Contact: Rick Rosenberg

                                                                         732-947-9273

Hamilton, NJ, October 9^th, 2009- Rob Calabro and Bill Harvey, the Republican Assembly candidates in the 14^th Legislative District, say Gov. Jon S. Corzine's intention to close an $8 billion budget deficit next year by raising taxes, reducing state workers and raiding the state pension system will have disastrous consequence for the region.

According to a report in today's edition of The Star-Ledger of Newark, Corzine says he intends to close a massive budget deficit by implementing a 2,000-employee reduction in the size of the state workforce, withholding $2 billion from the state pension system, leaving an income tax surcharge in place and cutting state aid to schools, which Calabro and Harvey said will force property taxes to increase even more.

"Now we know Corzine's plan," said Calabro. "Now the thousands of state workers and struggling middle class families living in the 14^th Legislative District deserve to know if our Democratic opponents will support this plan, as they have every other Corzine budget plan in the past."

"Corzine claims he will achieve a 2,000-job reduction in the state workforce through a hiring freeze," Harvey said. "Suppose his expectation falls short? If Corzine ends up being a lame duck governor and his ‘job freeze' fails, what's his recourse? Layoffs? What's to stop him? Is this the kind of budget plan Assemblywoman Linda Greenstein and Assemblyman Wayne DeAngelo thinks is right for people in our district? We already know that Linda and Wayne have a track record of voting with the Governor 98% and 99% of the time respectively. If there ever was a time for them to stand up to Corzine and their party, the time is now."

 "It's clear Corzine and his supporters intend to foist their fiscal problems onto the backs of state workers and middle class families," Calabro said. "The governor is obviously content to place the pensions of thousands of public employees at risk and increase the tax burden for people who already pay the highest property taxes in the nation to cover up four years of fiscal mismanagement."

"We don't need to punish state workers or taxpayers," asserted Harvey. "We don't need higher taxes or layoffs. What is needed is the leadership and determination to find and end the waste and political pork that consumes billions of tax dollars a year. Four years of rising taxes, spending and debt created the mess we're in. Higher taxes won't get us out of it."

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