Gov. Christie has been silent on budget's details, causing concern for legislators
Gov. Chris Christie's budget address today will launch a tumultuous budget season in the state as lawmakers debate cuts to business taxes, re-tooled school aid and reformed pension and health benefits for public workers.TRENTON &mdash Gov. Chris Christie will unveil a state budget today, after months of saying he plans to cut business taxes, revamp school aid, reform pension and health benefits for public workers and bring back some property tax relief.
The governor, who also suggested cuts to Medicaid may be in the offing, will deliver his annual budget address this afternoon at the Statehouse. The talk will kick off what is expected to be a contentious budget season, following one that produced a controversial $29.4 billion spending plan last June.
Christie’s office refused to disclose any details of the budget in advance of the speech, rankling leading lawmakers who won’t be briefed until Tuesday morning.
"We’ve heard nothing from the administration. This is not a good start," said Senate President Stephen Sweeney (D-Gloucester).
The 2 p.m. speech will be aired on the New Jersey Network and News 12 New Jersey. The Star-Ledger Statehouse Bureau will be live blogging the speech on nj.com.
Christie revealed his priorities in a series of town hall meetings and interviews the past six weeks. He said he would include tax cuts for businesses in the budget, and that his campaign vow to slice income taxes would come only after the economy improved. With revenues rebounding slightly, Christie also talked optimistically about beginning to restore taxpayer rebates he drastically cut last year.
Christie also promised to revamp how New Jersey funds its public schools. In the past several years, the state has spent about $10 billion annually on education, though Christie cut funding to local districts in the current fiscal year after federal stimulus money expired.
Those cuts prompted a court challenge now being examined by a special master appointed by the state Supreme Court. Senate Republicans are pushing Christie to send more money to suburban districts, and cut pre-school programs in the state’s poorest districts from full-day to half-day.
Christie has said there will be no increases to state aid to towns and cities even as many communities are trying to live under a 2 percent property tax growth cap without reductions in services.The governor told the state’s mayors his "tool kit" of reforms would help them cut costs and keep taxes in line, but only one major piece of his plan was approved by the Legislature.
Christie also pledged to make a contribution to New Jersey’s ailing pension system after skipping a $3 billion payment last year. A law the governor signed last year calls for paying at least one-seventh what actuaries say is needed, which would be in the $500 million range. The governor said any contribution this year would be far less than $3 billion.
Meanwhile, Christie wants to raise the retirement age for state workers, rework the formula to make pensions less lucrative and require state employees to contribute significantly more to their retirement fund. Democrats have their own reform plan, but both sides are far apart.
Christie and Sweeney have public health benefit reform proposals that share much common ground, particularly in their calls for employees to kick in more for their coverage. Christie could factor savings from such reforms into his budget as he begins contract negotiations with state workers.
The governor also signaled the budget can’t sustain the current level of Medicaid funding, given the loss of about $800 million in federal stimulus dollars used to prop up the program last year during the economic downturn.
New Jersey is expected to spend about $4.4 billion during the fiscal year that ends June 30 to cover about 1.3 million of the state’s poorest residents. That includes millions for optional services like prescription medicines, vision and dental care that the governor could slice out of the budget.
He could also save money by reducing the number of people who are Medicaid-eligible, a move that would need the blessing of the federal government. The health care overhaul President Obama signed last year requires states to maintain coverage for their Medicaid-eligible populations.
Assemblyman Jon Bramnick (R-Union) said today is the beginning of a long process. "It’s just a speech," he said. "I don’t suspect that every single line (of the budget) has been filled in."
Star-Ledger staff writers Matt Friedman and Chris Megerian contributed to this report.