TRENTON — Less than a month before Gov. Chris Christie will lay out his state budget plan, Republicans in the Assembly are shaking up their budget team. Assembly Budget Officer Joseph Malone (R-Burlington), the party’s top member on the committee, stepped down Wednesday after seven years in the post, saying the budget process has become "an injustice to the...
TRENTON — Less than a month before Gov. Chris Christie will lay out his state budget plan, Republicans in the Assembly are shaking up their budget team.
Assembly Budget Officer Joseph Malone (R-Burlington), the party’s top member on the committee, stepped down Wednesday after seven years in the post, saying the budget process has become "an injustice to the citizens of New Jersey."
And today, Assemblyman David Wolfe (R-Ocean), who has sat on the committee since 2009, plans to announce he will also step down.
The two veteran assemblymen will be replaced by less experienced members who will raise their political profiles by sitting on the panel. Declan O’Scanlon (R-Monmouth), who already sits on the committee, will become the GOP’s top ranking member. Assembly Republicans today plan to announce that Gary Chiusano (R-Sussex) and Anthony Bucco (R-Morris) will join the panel.
The Democratic-dominated committee, led by Assemblyman Louis Greenwald (D-Camden) parses the governor’s proposed budget, which he will announce in a budget address on Feb. 22, before releasing it for a vote in the full Assembly — a process that involves months of hearings that sometimes run all day.
Malone said he grew tired of hearing after hearing in which few issues got resolved.
"It’s become absolute theater," he said. "I think the way the budget process is going right now is such an injustice to the citizens of New Jersey. It ends up being nothing more than people haranguing."
Malone, who will become one of several deputy minority leaders, said he may attend some budget hearings and will "gladly speak out if it just becomes stupid, idiotic theater."
Wolfe said he’s leaving because he wants to focus more on his role as ranking member of the Assembly Education Committee as Christie wants to focus on education reforms.
Both said they made their own decisions to leave the posts, and Republican leaders insisted they were not pressured to leave.
"There is no strategy," said Assemblyman Jon Bramnick (R-Union), the second-highest ranking Republican in the Assembly. "It’s just people who may have had enough."
Tom Wilson, a former state Republican chairman, said he expects the new members to set a different tone on the committee.
"You’ve got two guys coming from the northwestern part of the state, which tends to be more conservative. I think you can see them being a little more aggressive in defending some of the cuts that are coming with this budget," he said.
Wilson noted that O’Scanlon took a pounding from Democrats last year while defending a controversial budget-related bill but came out looking good because he was well-prepared.
Greenwald said he and Malone had a friendly adversarial relationship. "Joe and I are kind of like an odd couple. You get comfortable with each other for a while, and I’m going to miss him. I’m sure he’s still going to be involved," he said.