Post by Libyan Sibyl on Oct 22, 2007 13:15:21 GMT -5
For most people, the ballot question is a shock when they get into the booth, and usually incomprehensible when they read it.
Here is an article from today's APP:
N.J. ballot question asks OK to borrow to preserve land
Open space fund has no more money
Posted by the Asbury Park Press on 10/21/07
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
TRENTON — If history is any guide, voters on Nov. 6 will do as they've done on 11 previous occasions: approve the open space funding question on the ballot.
However, with the state's finances a wreck and residents feeling hypersensitive to any proposal that increases state debt, advocates for open space preservation say they are not taking voter support for granted.
Some 90 environmental and public interest groups have launched a public relations campaign to promote passage of open space funding, ballot question No. 3. Organizers of the "Keep It Green" campaign are staging multiple pro-preservation events in every county, taping radio ads, posting fliers and employing other get-out-the-vote strategies.
"The voters of New Jersey understand the importance of land preservation," said "Keep It Green" spokesman John Malay. "Having said that, we are in an atmosphere today where property taxes are in the newspaper every other day. There is an unprecedented sensitivity to taxes in New Jersey."
The public question asks voters to approve borrowing $200 million to buy lands for recreation and conservation purposes, preserve farmland, buy up parcels in flood zones and fund historic preservation projects.
The money would replenish the Garden State Preservation Trust, the financing authority through which land is preserved, for one year while longer-term funding is sought.
The trust is out of money, but Gov. Corzine and the Legislature struck a compromise on open space in June when they agreed to ask voters to approve the stopgap, one-year, funding for the trust. Corzine said he preferred to fund open space through a source other than borrowing, but he has not yet identified where the money would come from.
The proposal before voters would spend $109 million preserving open space and parkland, $73 million preserving farmland, $12 million on anti-flooding plans and $6 million on historic preservation.
"Keep It Green" says the spending would curb development, save farmland and historic sites and create new parks. Opponents argue that the measure would increase borrowing in an already heavily indebted state.
A study by the Office of Legislative Services on the proposed land preservation borrowing found it would increase state debt by $15.27 million per year.
Assemblyman Richard Merkt, a state borrowing critic, has bashed the proposed borrowing.
"New Jersey is slowly bleeding to death from state government's borrowing too much to feed its spending addiction," said Merkt, R-Morris.
New Jersey's debt has nearly doubled since 2000 to about $30 billion and will cost the state about $3 billion this year, about 10 percent of the state budget.
Republican Steve Lonegan, the mayor of Bogota in Bergen County, has launched a campaign against all three public questions that involve money. Lonegan claims on his Americans for Prosperity Web site that the open space initiative would give authorities more power to seize private property through eminent domain.
"Question 3 gives the state the power and money to begin "negotiations' with homeowners who live near rivers to sell their land to the state for "open space' — part of an ongoing effort to stop construction of one-family homes in New Jersey in favor of high-density attached townhouses, condominiums and apartment buildings," he says.
www.app.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071021/NEWS03/710210461/1007/
TO VIEW READER COMMENTS, GO HERE:
forums.app.com/viewtopic.php?t=20313
Here is an article from today's APP:
N.J. ballot question asks OK to borrow to preserve land
Open space fund has no more money
Posted by the Asbury Park Press on 10/21/07
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
TRENTON — If history is any guide, voters on Nov. 6 will do as they've done on 11 previous occasions: approve the open space funding question on the ballot.
However, with the state's finances a wreck and residents feeling hypersensitive to any proposal that increases state debt, advocates for open space preservation say they are not taking voter support for granted.
Some 90 environmental and public interest groups have launched a public relations campaign to promote passage of open space funding, ballot question No. 3. Organizers of the "Keep It Green" campaign are staging multiple pro-preservation events in every county, taping radio ads, posting fliers and employing other get-out-the-vote strategies.
"The voters of New Jersey understand the importance of land preservation," said "Keep It Green" spokesman John Malay. "Having said that, we are in an atmosphere today where property taxes are in the newspaper every other day. There is an unprecedented sensitivity to taxes in New Jersey."
The public question asks voters to approve borrowing $200 million to buy lands for recreation and conservation purposes, preserve farmland, buy up parcels in flood zones and fund historic preservation projects.
The money would replenish the Garden State Preservation Trust, the financing authority through which land is preserved, for one year while longer-term funding is sought.
The trust is out of money, but Gov. Corzine and the Legislature struck a compromise on open space in June when they agreed to ask voters to approve the stopgap, one-year, funding for the trust. Corzine said he preferred to fund open space through a source other than borrowing, but he has not yet identified where the money would come from.
The proposal before voters would spend $109 million preserving open space and parkland, $73 million preserving farmland, $12 million on anti-flooding plans and $6 million on historic preservation.
"Keep It Green" says the spending would curb development, save farmland and historic sites and create new parks. Opponents argue that the measure would increase borrowing in an already heavily indebted state.
A study by the Office of Legislative Services on the proposed land preservation borrowing found it would increase state debt by $15.27 million per year.
Assemblyman Richard Merkt, a state borrowing critic, has bashed the proposed borrowing.
"New Jersey is slowly bleeding to death from state government's borrowing too much to feed its spending addiction," said Merkt, R-Morris.
New Jersey's debt has nearly doubled since 2000 to about $30 billion and will cost the state about $3 billion this year, about 10 percent of the state budget.
Republican Steve Lonegan, the mayor of Bogota in Bergen County, has launched a campaign against all three public questions that involve money. Lonegan claims on his Americans for Prosperity Web site that the open space initiative would give authorities more power to seize private property through eminent domain.
"Question 3 gives the state the power and money to begin "negotiations' with homeowners who live near rivers to sell their land to the state for "open space' — part of an ongoing effort to stop construction of one-family homes in New Jersey in favor of high-density attached townhouses, condominiums and apartment buildings," he says.
www.app.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071021/NEWS03/710210461/1007/
TO VIEW READER COMMENTS, GO HERE:
forums.app.com/viewtopic.php?t=20313