New Jersey
NJ legislature considering $56.6 billion budget; vote expected Friday
3-minute read
Historic savings for taxpayers as NJ debt is being paid down
Historic savings on the way for taxpayers as New Jersey debt is being paid down, Gov. Phil Murphy said during his 2025 state budget address.
With less than a week before the end of the fiscal year, legislative committees were in Trenton on Wednesday to advance a budget bill.
The Assembly Budget Committee was scheduled to start at 2 p.m. – though it was later updated to 4:30 p.m. − and the Senate at 4 p.m., both were hours late to start as they considered the state’s spending plan for fiscal year 2025 – which runs from July 1 through June 30, 2025.
The bill language was not posted online but documents were obtained by reporters around 8 p.m. The bill was introduced as a $56.6 billion budget, an increase of about $728 million over the governor’s proposal and $2.3 billion more than the fiscal year 2024 budget.
Revenue projects indicate that the state will earn about $54.5 billion in the new fiscal year, meaning the budget functions at a deficit of $2.1 billion. Projects show a surplus of about $6.1 billion.
Not everyone was on board with the plan and the business lobbyists was among the most vocal.
Chris Emigholz of the New Jersey Business and Industry Associate called it a “bad budget,” pointing to the structural deficit in the bill.
“It’s bad for our taxpayers. It’s bad for our job creators. It’s bad for our fiscal responsibility,” he said.
Tom Bracken of the New Jersey Chamber of Commerce said that the “business community has run out of patience.”
But advocates like Peter Chen of the New Jersey Policy Perspective spoke in support of the bill.
“This is a budget that leads us on a path towards a better New Jersey, towards a New Jersey where the mighty and powerful are forced to pay what they owe to support the investments that help everyday New Jerseyans,” he said.
State Sen. Declan O’Scanlan, the Republican budget officer, said the “already bloated” budget is worse than it had been with the addition of discretionary spending items.
“The fact that we are massively increasing spending at a time when we have already done so over the last six years of this administration, is in many ways a runaway freight train,” he said. “In just the last week, we’ve added almost $700 million.”
State Sen. Paul Sarlo, the committee chair said that “no budget is ever perfect this is not either quite frankly” but that the process of creating a budget with two branches of government and two houses of the Legislature requires a lot of give and take.
He said there is supplemental spending but that many are “spending priorities” and “one time infrastructure” items and that they are a “very, very small components to this budget.”
Sarlo also candidly announced that he wished the corporate transit fee wasn’t included but he understands the “transit issue is looming and in order to stay competitive and get people to work you need a vibrant transit system.”
“No transit agency across this entire country is solely dependent on ridership,” he said. “Can we do better? We have to do better with transit.”
The bill was ultimately cleared in the Senate along party lines.
Gov. Phil Murphy proposed a $55.9 billion spending plan in February and then handed it off to the Legislature to figure out the details and after months of testimony and negotiations the budget appeared before committee.
Among the other bills to clear committee was a 2.5% corporate transit fee for businesses in the state earning more than $10 million. Details on that bill, sponsored by Senate President Nick Scutari, were scarce as well but the idea was first proposed by Murphy in his budget address in February.
Another bill geared toward providing medical debt relief also cleared committee despite testimony against it. Sarlo said that the bill would pass because it was a non-negotiable priority for the administration.
After clearing both committees, the budget is set to be voted on in full chambers on Friday. The governor has until midnight Sunday to sign the bill.
New Jersey
N.J. pulls funding for Jersey City French museum project, calling it 'no longer viable' • New Jersey Monitor
State officials have yanked funding for a planned French art museum in the heart of Jersey City after determining the project is no longer viable, according to letters obtained by the New Jersey Monitor.
The state Economic Development Authority sent a letter Saturday to the president of The Centre Pompidou museum in Paris telling him the North American location Pompidou wants to open in Jersey City’s Journal Square section will not receive the tens of millions in aid New Jersey has promised. Lawmakers have reallocated state funds previously set aside for the Jersey City Pompidou outpost, a state official wrote in a separate letter to the head of the Jersey City agency overseeing the project.
“Due to the ongoing impact of COVID and multiple global conflicts on the supply chain, rising costs, an irreconcilable operating gap, and the corresponding financial burdens it will create for New Jersey’s taxpayers, the Legislature has rescinded financial support, leaving us to determine that this project is unfortunately no longer feasible,” Economic Development Authority chief Tim Sullivan wrote in a Saturday letter to Laurent Le Bon, the Pompidou’s president.
In the other letter, sent Saturday from Michael Greco, deputy executive director of the Department of State, to Jersey City Redevelopment Agency chief Diana Jeffrey, Greco asked the agency to return $6 million the state department has given for the project but has not been spent yet. The $24 million lawmakers had allocated in the 2024 budget and the $18 million the was part of the 2022 budget has been returned to the state’s general fund, the letter says.
“Based on the Legislature’s actions, there is no longer any State support available for this project,” Greco wrote.
The state’s decision to reassign funds meant for the museum, called the Centre Pompidou x Jersey City, is not a surprise. The city’s mayor, Steve Fulop, went public in April with claims that New Jersey officials were taking funding away from the Pompidou to retaliate against him for retracting his endorsement of first lady Tammy Murphy’s now-scuttled bid for the U.S. Senate.
Fulop is seeking the Democratic nomination for governor next year.
Jersey City and Pompidou officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The Economic Development Authority has acknowledged it had doubts about the financial viability of the Jersey City Pompidou project, citing a $19 million hole in the museum’s operating budget. Jersey City had been hoping for a $2 million annual subsidy for the museum, but that will not happen, Greco’s letter says.
Jersey City has until Aug. 1 to return the $6 million provided by the Department of State, the letter adds.
The Centre Pompidou x Jersey City plan has long been criticized by Republicans, who opposed using state funds for it. As Sullivan and Fulop traded barbs over the funding last month, Republican lawmakers wrote a letter to the state urging the funding to go toward a “more responsible purpose.”
The museum was originally slated to open in early 2024, but that was pushed to as late as 2027. When city officials announced plans for the museum in 2021, they said it would reinvigorate Journal Square and transform it into an arts, entertainment, and tourism hub.
In the letter to Pompidou’s president, Sullivan commends its staff for their collaborative work and says he hopes to continue strengthening the “economic and cultural bond” between France and New Jersey. He added he is disappointed by the outcome.
“While the door on this particular project has now been closed, we are eager to explore possibilities of opening new doors, with our partners in France, in the years to come,” he said.
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New Jersey
About 1 in 3 people live near an N.J. warehouse and its pollution. What will it take to stop?
Ad Choices
The Teaching Profession is one of the most unique career fields in the United States. Most teachers typically work 50-60 hours a week from September to May. When not working during the school year, many teachers pick up Summer jobs or work for the Summer School program.
Also, getting a teaching career started involves taking a state-specific certification test along with other prerequisites depending on what school they work at and what level of education they are working as a teacher.
Researchers from the University of Technology Sydney Online gathered data from the National Center for Education Statistics, the National Council on Teacher Quality, and the National Education Association to find out what are the best states to be a teacher in America.
The team at UTS Online weighed the following factors when creating their rankings of the best and worst states to be a teacher:
-Teacher Compensation
-Education and School Statistics
-Student Performance and Attainment
-Teacher Employment and Preparation
-School Environment
Where Does New Jersey Rank on the List of Best States For Teachers
In a Press Release from UTS Online, their research team ranked New Jersey as the second-best state for Teaching Careers in America. New Jersey Schools rank as some of the Safest Education Environments in the United States and a high rate of New Teachers ( 56 percent ) qualify for Teacher Pensions in New Jersey.
New Jersey Students rank number two in the United States in the Student Performance and Attainment Category, meaning that many NJ Students have a clear path to attaining a High School Degree. This makes a New Jersey Teacher’s job more straightforward compared to other states.
One more area unique to The Garden State is 8th Grade Students in New Jersey average the highest NAEP reading scores in the United States (270.25). This is significantly higher than New Jersey’s neighboring states of Pennsylvania and Delaware.
According to the UTS Rankings, Pennsylvania is the 12th best state for Teaching Careers and Delaware is 31st overall. Pennsylvania received low scores for Teacher Employment and Preparation while Delaware got low scores for Teacher Compensation.
Here are the Top Ten Best States For Teachers:
1. Massachusetts
2. New Jersey
3. Connecticut
4. New York
5. North Dakota
6. Maryland
7. Illinois
8. Georgia
9. Colorado
10. Vermont
11. Virginia
12. Pennsylvania
Continuing the conversation about Education in New Jersey, here is a ranking of the Best Public Schools in The Garden State based on Average Academic Scores:
Top 30 public schools in New Jersey
These are the 30 highest-ranking public and charter schools in New Jersey based on the 2022-23 summative ratings provided by the state Department of Education’s annual NJ School Performance Report. The schools are listed in ascending order, with the highest rating being 100.
Gallery Credit: New Jersey 101.5
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