Corzine's Misguided Financial Preferences

Governor Jon Corzine (D) is looking to fund school construction with increased tolls in New Jersey. What is he thinking? Can we have a more inane proposal?

First, here's some background. New Jersey already has dedicated property taxes to go for paying for education in the state. That was deemed insufficient to cover costs and property taxes rose out of control, so the Governor and Legislature decided to impose a personal income tax in the 1970s to relieve the burden of paying for education in the state. Even that was insufficient, so the sales tax was increased last year to provide property tax relief. The Trenton shell game was fully in play.

Still, property taxes continue to rocket out of control, along with costs for education, and the state has squandered millions in the School Construction Corporation, which Corzine abolished because that wasn't getting the job done. The SCC was created at a New Jersey court's behest to spend money on school infrastructure. More than $8 billion was set aside for that task, and while some projects were completed, hundreds more were left on the drawing board as mismanagement squandered the opportunity.

So, his response to funding construction of education facilities is to leverage the toll roads to borrow money for education. That, in effect, will mean raising tolls.

New Jersey provides nothing more than a shell game for paying for its operation. Now, Gov. Corzine wants to increase the shell game to include toll hikes to cover education spending? Let's remember that it was only a few days ago that Corzine was talking about needing tolls to cover transportation funding to build new bridges and renovate obsolete or bridges with deficient structural ratings. Those two goals cannot be achieved at the same time without substantial and significant toll hikes. Either that, or Corzine wasn't serious about funding transportation projects. His priorities are all askew here.

The Turnpike and GSP tolls are needed to fund maintenance and infrastructure improvements for transportation projects around the state, and should not be diverted to other purposes, including school construction projects. This is just another end-run to pinch taxpayers of more money for projects around the state without having to raise property taxes or the personal income tax. If Corzine attempted that, the state would have a tax revolt on their hands.

Corzine's answer to the state's fiscal woes is to increase taxes, tolls, and selling or leveraging state assets. Nowhere has Corzine ever bothered to look at the other side of the ledger and deal with the bloated state payroll, the gold-plated benefits packages, and the cumulative effect of years of bloated payrolls have on the state budget.

Frankly, Gov. Corzine is proving to be nothing more than a tax and spend Democrat. His supposed fiscal prowess is showing to be poor at protecting the State's fiscal stability and taxpayer wallets. The call to use tolls to fund education projects smacks of nothing more than pandering to a crowd, and is not leadership.