Jennifer Beck and her 12th district running mates continue to try to chip away at State Sen. Ellen Karcher’s reputation on ethics reform, but the efforts have led Karcher’s campaign to ask one question: what has Beck done lately?

The 12th district Republican candidates issued a press release today criticizing Karcher and Assemblyman Panter’s pension forfeiture bills, which do not apply retroactively, allowing politicians like Wayne Bryant and Sharpe James to keep their pensions even if convicted. Beck, a first-term Assemblywoman, had introduced an alternative bill that would have applied retroactively.

12th District Republican legislative candidates Jennifer Beck, Declan O’Scanlon and Caroline Casagrande today criticized Ellen Karcher and Mike Panter for their prime sponsorship of a law which could allow corrupt elected officials like recently indicted Newark Mayor Sharpe James and federally indicted Senator Wayne Bryant to keep their pensions even if convicted of job related crimes.

State Sen. Ellen Karcher’s call for the resignation of two fellow Democratic legislators is an election year gimmick, according to her Republican opponent, Assemblywoman Jennifer Beck.

Karcher’s statement today calling for the resignations of Sharpe James and Wayne Bryant comes five months after Beck first called on her to seek Bryant’s ouster, and four days after Democratic State Chairman Joseph Cryan gave her cover by urging the two indicted Senators to quit.

Since September, Beck has issued regular press releases pressuring Karcher and the Democratic leadership to take disciplinary action against scandal-plagued Senate colleagues. Even before Bryant was indicted in March, Beck had already made three bids for Bryant’s removal from the Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee and to pressure him to step down.

Assemblywoman Jennifer Beck today blasted her State Senate opponent Ellen Karcher for calling on Senator Wayne Bryant to step down 4 months after being indicted by a federal grand jury on 13 counts related to his misuse of his state office for personal gain, and 11 months after a report by a federal monitor at UMDNJ revealed the no-show job he was eventually indicted for. 

KARCHER CALLS ON BRYANT, JAMES TO STEP DOWN

Ethics champion says momentum toward reform cannot be allowed to stop

FREEHOLD – Senator Ellen Karcher (D-Monmouth and Mercer) today called on indicted State Senators Wayne Bryant (D-Camden) and Sharpe James (D-Newark) to resign their offices immediately, citing the need to restore the public’s trust and to focus on doing the people’s business in Trenton.

Dana Redd says she will give up her county job and not seek re-election as a Camden City Councilwoman if voters elect her to the State Senate in November. Redd is seeking for the fifth district seat of State Sen. Wayne Bryant, who announced his retirement shortly before his indictment on corruption charges last month. She is the considerable favorite to win the seat in the heavily Democratic district.

Redd's term as a Councilwoman ends on July 1, 2009, which means the opponent to dual officeholding will serve in both jobs for about eighteen months, if she wins. She says she will remain in her unpaid post as Vice Chairwoman of the New Jersey Democratic State Committee.

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT...

Christmas in July? Bah, humbug!
They're called "legislative initiatives."
They really are out-of-control budget stuffers.
Editorial, The Philadelphia Inquirer, February 23, 2007

The New Jersey Legislature should end Christmas in July.

Thats the last-minute practice of stuffing the state budget with "legislative initiatives" for the folks back home - sidewalks, recreation centers, library additions, firefighter equipment.

Some are worthy projects; some are special-interest payoffs. But how would the public know? They're usually negotiated in the dark of night.

Last July, after a weeklong government shutdown caused by an impasse over the proposed 1-cent sales-tax increase, Democrats spent another day behind closed doors porking up the budget with as much as $300 million in pet projects, known as "Christmas tree items."

Gov. Corzine got rid of the most egregious add-ons through line-item veto. After his vow to change the way Trenton did business, he should have slashed even more.

Yesterday, Corzine embraced Senate President Richard Codey's proposal to bring "legislative initiatives" into the light of day. All modifications to the governor's budget would have to be submitted to budget committees at least 14 days before the committee was scheduled to take action. It's a good start point for reform.

The eleventh-hour goodies defy sound budgeting. It's ATM time, not justification for the best project.

It's no wonder that last week U.S. Attorney Christopher Christie subpoenaed records related to these last-minute expenditures between 2004 and 2006. He's reportedly investigating whether any legislator personally benefited from the hundreds of millions of dollars allocated.

The new subpoenas are believed to be related to an ongoing federal investigation of State Sen. Wayne Bryant (D., Camden). A federal monitor appointed by Christie concluded in September that Bryant did "little or no work" at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. The monitor concluded that Bryant was hired to use his influence as chair of the powerful Senate budget committee to direct millions in extra funding to the school.

Bryant has denied the allegations. He stepped down from the committee last fall. He has not said whether he will run for reelection in November.

Regardless of the outcome of the Bryant case, the Legislature should eliminate the annual stocking-stuffing. It's wasteful and rightly intensifies public distrust in government.

"We have tough choices coming, and the public needs to trust that we are working for them - not ourselves, not our friends, and not anyone else," Corzine said yesterday.

Legislators should justify their budget requests, just as Cabinet members do.

It's time to stow the Christmas tree. Spring budgets are better symbolized by fresh air and open doors.

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Corzine plays it safe in budget
Gloucester County Times, Editorial excerpts, February 23, 2007

The legislators got their present from the governor. The unions got theirs. What about the rest of us? A pat on the head, and a lecture that things won't be as bad as a year ago... The budget represents too little effort in terms of state program cuts... In November, lawmakers' performance needs to be judged on forward progress on these items, not just a one-year breather from some budget pain.

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For more information, contact:
Assembly Republican Press Office / 609-292-5339

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IN CASE YOU MISSED IT...

N.J.'s pork barrel It will be quite the court scene: on one side, formidable prosecutors from the U.S. district attorney's office and on the other, lawyers representing the state's Office of Legislative Services (OLS)... All of this is happening, as New Jersey taxpayers know all to well, at a time when property, sales and income taxes are choking residents while the Legislature cries poor. How in the world could lawmakers approve such projects as assistance to local private youth clubs or municipal park improvements at a time when a one-cent sales tax was enacted to help dig out the state from its systemic financial mess? That, fortunately, is what Mr. Christie would like to know, too... Assembly Republicans, the minority in the Legislature, have called for the release of all the records requested by federal investigators. Further, they have called on the Legislative Services Commission to call an emergency public meeting to investigate the matter. As the minority, they may be whistling in the wind, but there just may be enough majority Democrats who are fed up with the annual added pork to shed light on a practice that both the Republicans and the Democrats have abused over the years.
- A look inside, Editorial
The Times of Trenton, February 14, 2007

New Jersey's citizens should be all for ripping the lid off any government communications that lead to the acquisition and distribution of public funds especially any communications that reveal any deals between legislators and recipients of state funds. It is not their money, not their office, not their government. It is ours. And if they (Wayne Bryant or anyone else) are misusing it or abusing it, we have a right to know, and to punish anyone guilty of selling our government for their own profit.
- Exit doesn't end Bryant pollution, Editorial
Gloucester County Times, February 14, 2007

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For more information, contact:
Assembly Republican Press Office / 609-292-5339

While there has been no formal announcement, Democratic leaders do not expect Wayne Bryant to seek re-election to his fifth district Senate seat. Bryant has reportedly been the center of a federal probe into legislative conflicts of interest involving the state budget. His law firm, through a newspaper ad, announced that their affiliation will end on March 1.

Senate President Richard Codey has no intention of restoring Bryant to his post as Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee. Instead, Senate sources say, Majority Leader Bernard Kenny will run the budget process on the Senate side this year.

Read this slowly, because it's a little confusing: Fanta Rosado, fired as the Lawnside Municipal Tax Clerk because of missing funds, is the niece by marriage of Lawnside Mayor Mark Bryant. Mark Bryant is the brother of State Senator Wayne Bryant, and the brother-in-law of Valerie Wallace, who Wayne Bryant's Chief of Staff. Valerie Wallace is Fanta Rosado's mother, and the sister of Gloucester County Freeholder Warren Wallace.

This is an unfortunate family legacy for the late Horace Bryant, a trailblazer who became the first African American to serve in a New Jersey Governor's cabinet when Richard J. Hughes appointed him Commissioner of Banking and Insurance in 1969, and for his daughter, Lillian Bryant, a former Atlantic County Freeholder.