'You're not going to solve a decades-long problem over a three-day holiday weekend,' says Budget Committee Chairman Louis Greenwald
Department of Community Affairs Commissioner Lori Grifa testifies before the Assembly Budget Committee in the Statehouse Annex in Trenton today.TRENTON — The Assembly Budget Committee heard testimony for five hours today but moved no closer to instituting a hard 2.5 percent statutory tax cap that Gov. Chris Christie has demanded.
Instead, Democrats insisted they needed more time, and especially more testimony from executive branch cabinet officials who were not available.
Assemblyman Albert Coutinho (D-Essex) said he was "extremely disappointed and somewhat even offended" that Christie had called the Legislature into special session but key people with critical information were not available to speak.
"This is a 30-year problem, and you're not going to solve a decades-long problem over a three-day holiday weekend, especially when some departments cannot even come in to answer our questions," said Assembly Budget Committee Chairman Louis Greenwald (D-Camden).
Greenwald Thursday night also requested to hear from someone from the Division of Pension and Benefits, the Department of Education and the Department of Community Affairs. Only Community Affairs Commissioner Lori Grifa showed up.
Taking questions from Democrats that lasted more than two hours, Grifa said the overwhelming majority of towns that applied for exemptions from the current 4 percent cap were granted them. The department's scope in deciding on exemptions is too limited, Grifa said.
"There is an implication there that this is a bit of a rubber stamp, and I don't think that's what anyone intended it to be," she said, adding that automatic exemptions in the current law for things like cuts in state aid, school enrollment, health care and pension costs have allowed other towns to exceed the cap without having to appeal to her department. Christie's proposed cap would, with few exceptions, only allow towns to exceed the cap with an override vote by residents.
Democrats argued the 4 percent cap is working better than the 30-year-old Massachusetts law that Christie's proposal is modeled on, arguing New Jersey's rate of property tax growth over the last two years was below that of Massachusetts. They said they needed more data on why that state's growth exceeded its cap, and asked Grifa to provide it.
"I haven't heard, and I don't think the public has heard, any significant movement towards what we are going to do to either reduce or cap property taxes for the State of New Jersey," said Assemblyman Joseph Malone (R-Burlington). "It's like another episode of 'How the State Turns.' We just have to do something different than come back day after day and it's the same dialogue going on between the same two or three people in the same setting."
The hot button issue of race arose twice during the committee hearings. When Grifa described Massachusetts as "whiter" than New Jersey, two Democrats asked her to clarify what she meant. Grifa said she was just trying to explain how the two states compare demographically.
In another exchange, NJEA Associate Director Rich Brown said a hard cap would impact poorer, minority-heavy communities most harshly.
"Some might even take a look at a hard cap and say it's a racist cap," he said.
Malone immediately jumped on the comment, saying "If you're going to have a presentation where you want to throw the word 'racist' around, I think you need to be careful."
After the hearing, Democrats said they had no plans to return to Trenton Saturday.
"The plan tomorrow is to have a hot dog, a hamburger and maybe a beer," said Assemblyman Gordon Johnson (D-Bergen).
More coverage:
• N.J. Assembly budget committee convenes to discuss property tax reform
• Legislature begins second day of special session with angry debate
• Special N.J. legislative session kicks off property tax cap showdown
• Gov. Chris Christie's prepared speech to the Legislature
• Gov. Christie to tell N.J. lawmakers job is 'only half done' at special joint session of Legislature