Myers Blasts Adler for Not Allowing Voters to Decide on $3.9 Billion School Construction Debt

Myers Blasts Adler for Not Allowing Voters to Decide

on $3.9 Billion School Construction Debt

Criticizes Adler for Skyrocketing State Debt Since 2002

         Mount Holly, July 7, 2008-Congressional candidate Chris Myers today blasted his opponent, Trenton politician John Adler, for voting to ensure that New Jersey taxpayers would have no say on whether the state should bond an additional $3.9 billion for school construction-a program that was rife with "mismanagement, fiscal malfeasance, conflicts of interest and waste, fraud and abuse of taxpayer dollars" according to an April 2005 report by NJ Inspector General Mary Jane Cooper.    

          On June 23, 2008, Adler voted to defeat an amendment offered by Senator Leonard Lance that would have placed this latest school construction bonding initiative on the November ballot and let voters decide its fate.  (See record of vote on next page, Source: NJ Legislature)

          "John Adler owes the taxpayers of this State an explanation," said Myers.  "His vote to block taxpayers from having a direct say on this multi-billion dollar bonding scheme is Trenton politics at its absolute worst.  The people of this state are sick of Trenton's arrogance, and frankly, so am I."        

          Myers pointed out that Adler has been a vital cog in the Trenton political machine whose government-by-credit card philosophy has forced state debt to skyrocket from $15 billion in 2002 to nearly $40 billion today, saddling current and future generations of state taxpayers with the third highest debt per capita in the entire country.  

          Myers said Adler's predictable defense-that he voted "No" against the new school construction bonding-is nothing more than transparent political expedience from a candidate for Congress who knew the bill had enough Democratic votes to pass without his support. 

          Myers, instead, pointed to Adler's long history in the legislature of reliably siding with Governors McGreevey and Corzine to pile up billions in debt without voter approval since 2002, and Adler's vote against Senator Lance's amendment that would have let voters decide the fate of the new bonding initiative at the polls this November, as the true measure of his record.

          "John Adler is desperately auditioning for a starring role on the political candidate's version of Extreme Makeover," said Myers.  "The problem is that voters in this state can see right through his act.  John Adler has been part of the problem in Trenton for 16 years, and he's incapable of being part of the solution in Washington."

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