Rae Roeder

Who is minding the Asylum!

Former Glen Ridge Mayor Carl Bergmanson stands with state workers reps outside the Statehouse on Tuesday.

TRENTON – Twenty-five red-shirted state workers from CWA Local 1039 hold signs aloft and march around the fountain in front of the Statehouse Annex screaming for Gov. Jon Corzine to “negotiate, not dictate,” and “no furloughs, no layoffs,” while inside on the fourth floor, Assemblyman Louis Greenwald (D-Camden) and Assemblyman Declan O’Scanlon (R-Little Silver) open up on each other with the first full-throated argument of these late morning budget hearings.

In the middle of this committee eyeballing of Corzine’s $29.8 billion budget, their disagreement occurs on the issue of whether New Jersey is the highest taxed state in the country. O’Scanlon says indeed it is, and the committee chairman disagrees, making the case that the assessment of tax impact should be made based on income. 

“For the top 1% of income earners – those making over $500,000, we’re the highest in the nation,” says Greenwald. “But for 99% of the population, we’re in the middle.”

But O’Scanlon still wants to know how New Jersey intends to approach next year’s budget when the proposal this year to stop the budget bleeding now includes $2.2 billion in one-time federal stimulus money, $1 billion in pension deferrals, $361 million in bond refinancing, and $800 million from a sunset provision tax increase and other single shot injections.

“I add up $4-5 billion right off the top,” says O’Scanlon. “We’re pushing out the budget schedule.”

Greenwald goes after him.