Budget Deficit Triples … and Trenton Wants to Spend?
Posted November 14, 2008

If you thought New Jersey’s budget deficit couldn’t get any worse, think again. According to a Star Ledger article published yesterday, the big “D” has tripled to a whopping $1.2 billion – far higher than the $400 million predicted by Governor Corzine last month. And that’s not even the worst of it. Administration estimates place at $5 billion the level to which the deficit may skyrocket next fiscal year.

Blaming the ballooning deficit on “the nation’s economic woes,” the Ledger notes, “After a dreadful October that saw tax revenue dive to $211 million less than the Corzine administration’s projections, the state is bracing for more pain in the coming months.” And according to Governor Corzine, this means that “[a]ll things are on the table” to address the deficit for the upcoming fiscal year.

Well, actually, not all things. Contradicting his own statement, Corzine said he would “absolutely not” seek to cut the spending outlined in the $150 million stimulus package he announced last month – spending that includes aid for food banks, money for home heating assistance, and funds to stimulate employment and economic activity. “Everything that we talked about in the stimulus program I think is more important today than it was before,” Corzine stated.

In fact, as the Ledger reports, as part of this stimulus, yesterday afternoon, the Assembly Appropriations Committee gave the nod to three bills, “including the $3,000 job creation bounty (A3374) [which would give business owners $3,000 for every full-time employee they hire] and a special appropriation of $12.3 million to shore up the near-bankrupt Legal Services program and steer $3 million in emergency aid to food pantries.” When it comes to paying for all of this, the Ledger indicates, “Funding for the stimulus programs is scheduled to come from a $650 million fund Corzine and lawmakers had set aside earlier this year to pay down New Jersey’s long-term debt, the third heaviest debt load in the nation.”

Addressing the grim scenario in a briefing, Corzine stated, “I don’t think many people think the national economy is turning, so we’ve got some more tough waters ahead.” And as the Ledger notes, Corzine indicated these tough roads would include renegotiating vendor contracts, putting off capital expenses, and identifying $600 million in cuts to departments.

But despite the rhetoric that these are tough times, that everything is on the table, and that cuts are in the offing, when Republican members of the Assembly Appropriations Committee offered over $69 million in budget cuts yesterday – cuts which would have included “reductions in the Special Municipal Aid fund, administrative salaries, compensation for members of part-time administrative boards, excessive procurement costs and special aid for four county prosecutors offices” – their efforts were rejected.

So, which will it be?

Governor Corzine keeps promising to tighten the state’s fiscal belt, but when the time comes – and passes – to do so, he and the legislative majority instead choose to continue to spend state money.

A $400 million budget shortfall was bad enough. A $1.2 billion shortfall is simply unacceptable. It’s time for the administration to put its money where its mouth is, put an immediate halt to ALL non-essential state spending, and take a scalpel to every departmental budget.

Otherwise $1.2 trillion will soon be only a drop in the bucket – no, the wheelbarrow – needed to measure New Jersey’s budget deficit.

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