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Corzine puts conditions on tax credit
Governor insists on comptroller's office and 4% cap on future property levy increases
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
BY DUNSTAN McNICHOL AND TOM HESTER
Star-Ledger Staff
Gov. Jon Corzine said yesterday he is unlikely to approve the 20 percent property tax credit lawmakers favor unless the Legislature first adopts other reforms, like a state comptroller's office and a 4 percent limit on future property tax increases.
"If I don't see the elements that give me confidence that we have the ability to sustain these over a period of time, we will hold up a tax credit program," Corzine said to reporters after a speech to the New Jersey Business and Industry Association in
Senate President Richard Codey (D-Essex) and Assembly Speaker Joseph Roberts (D-Camden) last month capped months of special hearings on property tax reform by announcing a plan to cut 20 percent from the property tax bills of "most" New Jersey homeowners.
The plan has since been refined. Currently it would cost $2 billion and offer property tax credits of 20 percent to homeowners earning up to $100,000; 15 percent to those earning between $100,000 and $200,000, and 10 percent for those with incomes between $200,000 and $250,000.
Yesterday, both Codey and Roberts accepted the Corzine's conditions for passage of the credit program.
"We have no problem with that at all," Codey said.
"The governor is right -- the 20 percent credit cannot be enacted in a vacuum," Assembly Speaker Joseph Roberts (D-Camden) said. "Establishing caps and a comptroller are essential elements in sustaining any property tax credit."
Corzine said work on the reform measures could stretch into February, well after the Dec. 31 deadline lawmakers had set for themselves.
"I don't think false dates like Jan. 1 are as important as knowing that when we write a budget, which this year is due Feb. 27, that we have in place a sustainable system of property tax reform," Corzine said. The budget must make its way through the Legislature and be signed into law by July 1.
But Codey said the credit program needs to be adopted quickly so the Treasury Department can set up the mechanism for delivering it when property tax bills go out next year.
Lawmakers are preparing to consider a full slate of property tax reform measures tomorrow, the final time both the full Senate and Assembly are scheduled to meet before year's end.
On Monday, lawmakers balked when they got their first look at the reform legislation that resulted from months of work by four special committees set up to find way to rein in school and local government spending.
"We looked at the recommendations and found it was hard to find the number of votes necessary for passage -- 21 in the Senate, 41 in the Assembly -- to pass these recommendations," Sen. Shirley Turner (D-Mercer), a top ranking Democrat, told a gathering of 83 mayors, council members and municipal officials at a convention in Lawrence yesterday.
"Now, sadly we find nothing all are in support of -- except everybody wants a 20 percent property tax cut," Turner said. "Everybody wants to go to heaven but nobody wants to do what it takes to get there."
The Senate has tentatively posted nine property tax-related measures for consideration tomorrow, including one (S-2) that would establish a comptroller's office to monitor spending by state and local governments.
Another (S-8) is a pared-down package of pension and health benefits reforms that follows Corzine's directive to limit the changes to elected and appointed officials. Thousands of teachers and unionized state workers had rallied in front of the Statehouse Monday to protest attempts to legislate changes to their publicly funded pensions. Corzine has said he will seek changes in contract negotiations with the unions.
Senators also are scheduled to consider amended versions of bills that passed the Assembly on Monday, including one (S-1) that would set up a special commission to target towns for consolidation, and another (S-10) to overhaul school board elections and establish county superintendents with veto power over local school budgets.
Both measures face opposition among Democrats, who control both the Senate and Assembly.
"Many objections have to do with the extreme powers extended to these super-superintendents," Sen. Barbara Buono (D-Middlesex), said after the bills were discussed in the Democratic party meeting on Monday.
Local officials at the New Jersey League of Municipalities conference where Turner spoke also weighed in against the new superintendents.
One, Glen Ridge Mayor Carl A. Bergmanson, called the plan "one of the worst proposals, one of the most bonehead proposals to come out of the Assembly, and that is saying a lot."
And another said local governments will never merge willingly.
"The only way consolidation will happen is if it is ordered (by the state)," said South Brunswick Manager Matthew U. Watkins, a former director of the state Division of Local Government Services. "None of us are going to do it voluntarily."
On Monday the proposal sparked a short-lived revolt on the Assembly floor by lawmakers from Essex and
State releases study showing how much education costs — hypothetically — in N.J.
By DIANE D'AMICO Education Writer, (609) 272-7241
Published: Wednesday, December 13, 2006
The median cost to provide a basic education to a child in
Thousands of additional dollars per student also would be needed to address special needs such as disabilities and poverty, bringing the average cost per student statewide to more than $11,000, or about $15.8 billion, which is just about what is already being spent.
The Department of Education did the study as the basis for the state to come up with a new funding formula. But education advocates who have been following the process said they are concerned that any model based on hypothetical districts should not be considered until the model has been run using real districts.
“The trouble with using the hypothetical models is that they don't bear any relationship to the real districts in the state,” said David Sciarra of the
Lynne Strickland, executive director of the Garden State Coalition of Schools, which represents suburban districts, said they too are concerned that the model used by the state has not been tested.
“Until we can see it used in real time, you can't really tell what it would mean,” she said.
The results of the study estimated total statewide spending at about $15.8 billion a year. The districts already spend $15.6 billion, and Sciarra was a bit suspicious that the state model came so close to actual spending. He said he was concerned that the model is based on what the state wants districts to spend, not what they actually need.
The state's consultant, John Augenblick, noted in the study that in other states, including
Three public hearings will be held around the state Monday, including a remote teleconference from the
Commissioner Lucille Davy said the hearings are just the beginning of the process, and more hearings would be held in January.
The state used two models to determine their costs. The first was averaging the actual costs in 305 so-called “successful districts.” Success was defined as meeting the state passing rates on state tests given in 2004-2005. Strickland said the current state benchmark is not that high, and implies that the state goal is not excellence, but just average student performance.
“Why should we be aiming for average?” she said.
Sciarra noted that the most successful districts include many that spend the most money, but the model does nothing to really examine how the money is spent, and whether it is all spent wisely.
The second model was based on creating six hypothetical models of different-sized K-8 and K-12 districts. Sciarra said the so-called Professional Judgement Panel, or PJP, model can be effective, but that in the true model, the panels create the models, not the state. In
“None of the models addressed the specific needs of real high-poverty urban districts,” he said.
Strickland also mentioned that a funding formula is only as good as the money put behind it, and there has been little discussion of how much the state would contribute and how it would be distributed.
Both Sciarra and Strickland called for more time to look more specifically at
“This ignores the Abbott Supreme Court rulings,” Sciarra said. “They could have at least looked at the actual urban districts.”
The full report, and information on the public hearings, is online at www. state.nj.us/education. The
To e-mail Diane D'Amico at The Press:
Lawmakers may miss deadline for property tax reform
Posted by the Asbury Park Press on 12/12/06
BY JONATHAN TAMARI
But one key piece of the package won Assembly approval after 8 p.m. Monday, and the state's leading lawmakers said they were back on the same page with Gov. Jon S. Corzine, pledging to advance their plans by the end of January.
"This clearly has been a frustrating process, but nothing that is this tough, nothing that is this important, is going to be done easily," said Assembly Speaker Joseph J. Roberts Jr., D-Camden.
Roberts and Senate President Richard J. Codey, D-Essex, sat down with Corzine in separate meetings Monday after a conflict on proposed benefit changes — and several prickly exchanges — threatened to drive a wedge between the three men who essentially run state government and hold the keys to property tax reforms.
Codey conceded there had been a communication breakdown but said the two sides resolved to get back on track with their plans for a 20 percent property tax credit for most homeowners, a cap on tax hikes and a new school funding formula.
"If we don't do it by February 1, shame on us," Codey said.
"We're very much on the same page and working together. The issue isn't so much how we do this, it's that we get it done and we get it done right," Roberts said.
Roberts won a victory after a long day of work when his plan to empower county school superintendents to control education spending — the source of the bulk of property tax bills — passed the Assembly.
The bill, which Roberts called a "significant building block," would also make changes to encourage municipalities to share services and move school board and fire district elections to November, when there is more voter participation.
The plan, however, faces some critics in the Senate, which did not take action on the bill.
Sen. Barbara Buono, D—Middlesex, worried that Roberts' plan, which would give county superintendents a line-item veto over local education budgets, would hurt local control of schools.
As thousands of teachers and state government employees rallied outside the Statehouse to warn lawmakers against benefit cuts, Roberts said any changes dealing with rank-and-file workers will be left to contract negotiations between Corzine and labor unions. Changes to end abuses by elected and appointed officials will move forward in the Legislature, Roberts said.
Corzine, who had urged lawmakers to be bold in their reforms, angered lawmakers last week when he asked them to delay action on public employee pension and benefit cuts. In a letter sent Sunday evening, Corzine said lawmakers' action could damage negotiations with labor unions, where he may seek a range of concessions.
Republicans chided Democrats for the recent disarray after four months of hearings intended to lay out the solutions to curb
"There appears to be some confusion on the Democratic side this week. I hope they get it together," said Sen. William Gormley, R-Atlantic.
Questions remained around several other plans, including proposals to launch a commission to push for municipal mergers and create a state comptroller to oversee state spending — a Corzine priority.
Those measures had been expected to move quickly and mark tangible action on easing the state's property taxes. But eight out of 12 Senate bills related to the issue were held up Monday. In the Assembly, seven of 10 bills advanced, including the measure to encourage mergers.
"The comptroller bill needs a lot of work," said Assemblyman John Burzichelli, D-Gloucester, one of the plan's sponsors.
Burzichelli, who is also mayor of Paulsboro, had concerns about how much power the comptroller could have to investigate and block local spending. Corzine has called for an office that can dig into spending at all levels of government.
Buono said the process was moving too fast and could lead to unintended consequences.
Buono said a commission that recommended town mergers would take power away from local officials, noting that her hometown, Metuchen, would be a likely target for consolidation as it is completely surrounded by
"What this does in my mind is create a shadow government," Buono said.
Jonathan Tamari: jtamari@gannett.com
