NJ budget talks ramp up ahead of Sunday night deadline
TRENTON, N.J. (PIX11) -- If it's late June, it's budget crunch time in New Jersey's Capital City.
Lawmakers continue to hammer away at the $56 billion budget proposed earlier this year by Governor Phil Murphy.
"The fact that this is not an election year for the State Legislature or for the Governor means that they are going to be a little more responsible than they would be in an election year," said Micah Rasmussen, Director of the Rebovich Institute for New Jersey Politics at Rider University. "In an election year, it's more of a feel-good budget. 'What can we do to make everyone feel like spending is where it needs to be without sort of raising the big taxes,' that kind of thing. This year, it's time to pay the piper."
Not many details have been revealed about the budget's current State, but Rasmussen says he expects the final budget to include the Corporate Transit Fee to help fund New Jersey Transit.
He says what education funding and property tax relief ultimately look like are worth monitoring.
The original budget proposed nearly $12 billion for schools—a nearly $1 billion increase over the previous budget—and $3.5 billion for the ANCHOR Property Tax Relief Program.
Assembly Democrats did not wish to comment on the budget at this time. Republican lawmakers have raised concerns of overspending, but Rasmussen says Democrats have the upper hand.
"The Democrats control the Senate, the Assembly, and the Governor's Office," said Rasmussen. They get to decide which budget is going to be signed.
Republican Assembly Budget Officer Nancy Muñoz raises questions over the budget process over the last few years and why it has taken until the last minute. "The public can't take a look at this because if they have 24 hours to go through multiple hundreds of pages of budget, they can't do it. It's impossible to do," said Munoz. "They have a right to know how their money is being spent."
The State must pass the budget before July 1st to avoid a government shutdown.