State Sen. Anthony Bucco (R-Boonton) says that an audit conducted by the State Auditor of the Senior Citizens’ and Veterans’ property tax deduction identified ““weakness in the verification of eligibility” for the two property tax relief programs administered by the state.

“It is disturbing that programs that are designed to help seniors and veterans cope with high property taxes in New Jersey are being abused. It is encouraging that the Department of the Treasury and the Department of Revenue are in the process of implementing the State Auditor’s recommendations,” said Bucco, the ranking Republican on the Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee.  “I hope that the State Auditor will continue to examine these programs and continue to identify the waste, fraud and abuse that is all-too common in the state budget.”

TRENTON - The state faces anywhere from an $8 to $11 billion structural budget deficit for the next fiscal year, largely as a casualty of a brutal economy, Legislative Budget and Finance Officer David Rosen told the Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee today.

Meanwhile, the current year’s deficit is about $2.2 billion (before taking into account the Corzine administration’s $1 billion in measures to reduce it).  That includes about $180 million more than previously discussed because of increased Medicaid costs.

Most of those numbers, which have been aired before, were not a surprise.  But the meeting was significant because, as the first of the new session, it gave its Democratic and Republican members – and its new chair, Paul Sarlo (D-Wood-ridge) – a chance to set the tone for the impending budget process. 

Committee members of both parties emphasized the need to work together to fix the state in a better fiscal condition, but early disagreements arose as to what factors further aggravated the current problems

What’s clear, according to Rosen, is that 2009 was the worst year in modern budget revenue history.  Not only did income tax decline, which happens in deep recessions, but so did the sales tax.  It dropped by 6% on top of a 9% drop last year, a development Rosen said was “extraordinary.”

“It’s very similar to what our colleagues are seeing elsewhere.  This is not a New Jersey phenomenon.  It’s a nationwide phenomenon,” he said.

Senate Republican Budget Officer Anthony Bucco made the following statement today as David Rosen, the Legislative Budget and Finance Officer, gave his mid-year update on the state budget to the Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee. Rosen's report indicated that the budget deficit for the remaining six months of fiscal 2010 has grown to almost $2.2 billion:

Every state taxpayer will pay for the raises Camden Mayor Dana Redd plans for top political appointees. Yet the Democrats in the Legislature don't want the governor to exercise meaningful oversight over the hundreds of millions of dollars poured into Camden each year.

Today is the last day in office for seven members of the State Assembly: Nilsa Cruz-Perez (D-Camden), Sandra Love (D-Laurel Springs), Richard Merkt (R-Mendham), Joseph Roberts (D-Camden), John Rooney (R-Northvale), L. Harvey Smith (D-Jersey City), and Joseph Vas (D-Perth Amboy).  Merkt have up his seat to seek the Republican gubernatorial nomination, and Smith ran unsuccessfully for Mayor of Jersey City; the others did not seek re-election.

Roberts, the Assembly Speaker, announced in September that he would not seek re-election to the seat he has held since replacing the late Francis Gorman (D-Gloucester City) in a 1987 special election.  Rooney is the most senior member of the Legislature; he won a 1983 special election after Joan Wright took a job in the Kean administration.  Vas dropped his re-election bid after federal and state corruption indictments, and Smith was arrested in July in connection to Operation Bid Rig.

Anthony Bucco, Jr. (R-Boonton), Craig Coughlin (D-Woodbridge), Domenick DiCicco (R-Franklin Twp.), Angel Fuentes (D-Camden), Charles Mainor (D-Jersey City), Donald Norcross (D-Camden) and Robert Schroeder (R-Washington) will take office tomorrow.  Bucco replaces Merkt, DiCicco won Love’s seat, Fuentes and Norcross will assume the seats left open by the retirements of Roberts and Cruz-Perez, Mainor replaces Smith, and Schroeder succeeds Rooney.

A year ago they gritted their teeth through the white and dark meat at Thanksgiving, hovered dutifully in each other's company through Christmas cocktails, sustained by the Irish and Italian traditions blended in familial harmony even as they felt the tractor beam of a coming political campaign hauling them toward their inevitable showdown. 

They figured when it was all over, regardless of who had won, they would be able to go back to the long table as - if not chummy friends - at least respectful brothers-in-law.

But Assemblyman-elect Tony Bucco, Jr. (R-Boonton Twp.) and Doug Cabana, the Morris County freeholder, couldn't easily return to the same fold this year, skipping over Thanksgiving and Christmas, if one is permitted to read between the lines.

There were too many hurts left over from their District 25 campaign, which Bucco won after enduring a Marquis of Queensbury contest run amok, in his opinion, that resulted at its worst in his father, state Sen. Anthony Bucco (R-Boonton), spending at least one overnight visit in the hospital with chest pains.

Neither Bucco nor Cabana will talk about the fracture, which could have bigger implications than the present silence between them.  
 
"I don't harbor any hard feelings against Doug," said Bucco, amid preparations for the opening of his western Morris County district office. "As far as I was concerned the day after the primary, it was over. I don't hold any hard feelings. I saw him at a Toys for Tots drive and shook his hand and wished him a Merry Christmas."

MORRIS TOWNSHIP -- Assemblyman Michael Patrick Carroll (R-Morris Township) is not the type of candidate to scurry around his district trying to squeeze out possible last minute votes.  Instead, he is spending the day painting his living room and taking his kids to a firing range. 

"Today there's really nothing much I can do.  In Morris County all the votes that I think can be gotten out already have been gotten out," said Carroll, an attorney, from the home he also uses as his law office. 

Motivating Republican voters in Morris County - the home of their gubernatorial candidate, Chris Christie - is not hard this year.  And Carroll, who sits in a relatively safe Republican district, is not expected to be defeated by Democrats Rebekah Conroy and Wendy Wright. 

That is not to say that Carroll has never faced competition.  After his district-mate, Assemblyman Rick Merkt (R-Mendham), decided not to seek reelection, Carroll found himself caught up in a three-way primary with Anthony Bucco, Jr. and Freeholder Doug Cabana.

New Jersey's casino laws leave little doubt that even the appearance of conflict of interest is unacceptable. Governor Corzine must reveal documents that would confirm definitively whether he is invested in a hedge fund with close ties to the casino industry.

Only Governor Corzine and the industry that peddled destructive subprime debt could believe it is 'frivolous' to disclose multibillion deficits and structural funding problems to the public and potential investors.

The six Republican members of the Senate Budget Committee have sent a letter to Chairwoman Barbara Buono that asks her to call the committee into session this summer. The committee's task would be to develop a plan to close an unprecedented $8 billion structural deficit and a more than $2 billion deficit in the unemployment fund. The letter points out that Governor Corzine is avoiding questions about how he plans to do to deal with this $10 billion crisis. "When there is a gap in leadership at the top, others must step in to fill the void, " said Senator Anthony Bucco, senior Republican member on the budget committee and Republican budget officer.