Bucco Condemns Latest Corzine Borrowing Gimmick

Urges End to Wall Street Games That Destroyed Our Economy

Senate Republican Budget Officer Anthony R. Bucco strongly condemned the Joint Budget Oversight Committee's approval of a debt restructuring gimmick that Governor Corzine plans to use to push more of today's crippling debt burden on to our children and grandchildren.

"The 'savings' that the treasurer is predicting from this debt sale are an illusion cooked up by desperate politicians and their enablers on Wall Street," Bucco said. "The proposal clearly proves Governor Corzine and legislative Democrats will continue to rely on unforgivably irresponsible gimmicks like the many others that Wall Street has hawked to New Jersey over the past eight years."

The Joint Budget Oversight Committee today approved a restructuring of bonded debt whereby the state will skip more than $100 million in payments in 2010 in return for higher debt and dramatically higher payments in future years. Corzine's budget relies on this plan and "savings" totaling more than $400 million from similar bond gimmicks that it has thus far refused to detail to the public.

"Everyone in America has learned the painful lessons of irresponsible borrowing it seems except Governor Corzine and the legislative Democrats," Bucco said. "This is the same kind of borrowing that led to the subprime mortgage disaster and the current economic crisis."

Incredibly, Assembly Budget Chairman Lou Greenwald stated at today's meeting that Corzine's refinancing is exactly what average Americans all across the country are doing every day. Bucco points out that many Americans are refinancing at lower interest rates to truly reduce their payments and borrowing costs -- not to add debt, push today's expenses on to their children or boost their interest costs. Yet the bond documents show this refinancing will both greatly increase both debt owed by the state, and the expense of paying back that debt.

"Adding to the crippling debt we are placing on our children is inexcusable, and that's why I voted against this measure," Bucco said.

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