Category: Bergen County

June 4,2017
the staff of the Ridgewood blog

Ridgewood NJ,  With the primary this week and all the articles about the massive amounts of money being spent on New Jersey Political races the one thing we have noticed is no one seems to really be paying any attention. Perhaps it graduation month or the reality of New Jersey coming demise , the constant calls for cutting taxes and fixing school funding all of which ring hollow or just the fact that no matter who you vote for ;criminality is rampant, corruption is king ,the state is run by Unions and special interests ,taxes will go up and all the problems will get much worse .

The well funded state Democrats have all tried to out bid each other for who can get the biggest and best tax increase, protect illegals with free stuff, harbor and promote terrorism , chase out the last bit of “free enterprise” ,further deplete the tax base and pay off all their special interest supporters

While the Ridgewood blog is still unsure if the New Jersey GOP is actually trying win or not a couple of upstarts have caught our eye.

First a 31-year-old Indian-American entrepreneur Harsh Vardhan Singh entered the governor’s race with little political background and a promise to cut property taxes and make New Jersey a national technology leader. Singh seems to be getting his feet wet for further political ambition ,but he comes off a bit naive to New Jersey’s down and dirty political landscape . He is some to keep an eye on for the future.

So that leaves us Joseph Rudy Rullo. If you say who ,you obviously don’t use social media much. Rullo an actor and small business owner who has run an off beat campaign patterned after the Trump campaign.

He has waged a one man crusade against the New Jersey establishment . Even going as far as to channel Trump’s drain the swamp line and apply it to Trenton .  Rullo has managed to get into screaming matches with political opponents, tap into New Jersey Trump voters anger, use social media very effectively and offer some common sense ideas to fix some on New Jersey’s most pressing issues.

In his own words ,”As Governor I will reduce property taxes, repeal the $.23 gas tax, dissolve the transportation SLUSH fund, Veto all tax increases, cut billions in political earmarked jobs and contracts, eliminate state income taxes on pensions for retirees and add 1 billion in new revenue sources to further lower taxes. I Will dissolve the Transportation Trust Fund and consolidate all highway authorities eliminating redundant high level management positions, eliminate high cost earmark & specialty contracts tied to contributors.. It will produce millions in savings with shared services and purchases.

I will eliminate tolls and repeal the gas tax with the savings from the new efficient transparent highway entity. I will also eliminate 1.3 billion in pension fees to NYC politically connected brokerage houses and replace with licensed brokers in the state investors division to pay towards pension payment.

Superintendents and business administrators need to be reduced drastically. Instead of having one superintendent and business administrator per school district, we need to cut the number to one per county. By consolidating superintendents & business administrators, we can save $50 million per year by eliminating superintendents alone. And will work to also eliminate municipal tax assessors to one per county. I will fire hundreds of high-salary patronage jobs like indicted Port Authority’s David Wildstein, as an example, saving hundreds of millions of dollars to cut taxes. ”

Rullo is : Pro life , Pro Second Amendment  and supports marijuana legalization. He wants to make NJ Veterans a priority . On school funding and education he has a lot to say ,”The Abott school districts need to be held accountable for wasteful spending and all districts need to work together to reduce cost. This will reduce the impact of inevitable changes in funding formulas with state aid. After all school districts cut wasteful spending, we need to implement fair funding formulas for property tax relief.  One example is all school districts can drastically reduce costs by combined purchasing power. Another example is drastically reducing the number of Superintendents and redundant assistant Superintendents.  High cost business administrators should also be reduced.

Since the start of No Child Left Behind and continued under Race to the Top, NJ parents and students have been saddled with the Common Core Standards. Parents feel like they can’t help their children with their homework because it is something they have never learned before and the children are left floundering in schools with too many children and not enough teachers to explain things to them. The State then decided to force the PARCC (Partnership for Readiness for College and Careers) test on our children. This has resulted in schools and teachers focusing their teaching efforts, not on learning, but on test results. This is wrong and only hurts our children who deserve a comprehensive learning program not a regimen of tests.

As Governor I will end PARCC testing completely and direct the Department of Education to draw up new, independent education standards that will return NJ to the top of the best educated Students in the Country.

I support school choice and home schooling.

Students come out of High School and don’t know how to balance a checkbook, write a resume or know anything about personal credit. Common Core needs to become Common Sense. Teachers need to be allowed to teach and not recite facts mandated from Washington, or some Corporation making money from our tax dollars. We need to provide better opportunities for students who decide to enter the workforce directly from high school with expanded vocational schools. The future of New Jersey depends on it! ”

On illegal immigration  Rullo says the “police are overburdened with hands virtually tied because NJ is a sanctuary state. Out of state license plates and DMV fraud are the law of the land. As Governor I will implement E- Verify for all employees working in New Jersey and work with President Donald Trump to eliminate sanctuary cities across NJ. Everyone must follow the same rules in business and follow the law. Our veterans will of NJ will be first priority in NJ hospitals not illegal immigrants.”

On the Heroin epidemic Rullo wants stricter sentencing for drug dealers , “to make it a living hell for heroin dealers in NJ. With that being said they should be charged for attempt of murder for distribution and automatic manslaughter if someone dies from their distribution. ”

Rullo suports Assemblywoman Holly Schepisi efforts on Forced Overdevelopment in Bergen County, and is the one candidate for that has promised to dissolve COAH  altogether while other candidates have only spoken in vague generalities or ignored the subject all together.

And finally the pervasive pension mess, Rullo says Eliminate 700 million in pension fees to NYC politically connected brokerage houses and replace with licensed brokers in the state investors division to pay savings towards pension payment.  The pension fees went from 125M to 700M per year in the last 7 years.

*Open up state employee health insurance bids across America to create competition to lower premiums and get better coverage for employees.

* Dedicate a portion of recreational marijuana revenues to pay towards pension payment.

* Open up a formal investigation and audit the pension fund for the last several decades to hold politicians in both parties accountable for their actions.