No repair in sight for N.J. transportation fund; talks collapse in hunt for revenue
MARCH 25, 2015, 3:51 PM LAST UPDATED: WEDNESDAY, MARCH 25, 2015, 11:07 PM
BY CHRISTOPHER MAAG AND MELISSA HAYES
STAFF WRITERS |
THE RECORD
Negotiations to fix New Jersey’s depleted transportation funding system have broken down, the state transportation commissioner said Wednesday. That means any permanent fix — including a possible gas tax increase — probably will not happen this year, elected officials and transportation experts said.
“The likelihood of it being resolved for the moment is not ideal,” said Commissioner Jamie Fox in reference to the upcoming November election when all 80 seats of the state Assembly are on the ballot. The primary filing deadline for that race is Monday. “It’s election time, which makes it a much more difficult thing |to do.”
Since the beginning of the year, Fox and leaders of both political parties have said the state’s transportation system faces a serious budget shortfall, and they pushed to fix it immediately. The fund that pays for major transportation projects takes in $1.2 billion annually, mostly from motor fuels taxes and turnpike tolls. Nearly all the money is dedicated to paying off more than $18 billion in debt, however, with little left for big maintenance projects and new construction.
https://www.northjersey.com/news/n-j-transportation-funding-talks-over-for-now-1.1295459
Here’s a fix: if the union contractors cannot do the work for 1/3 of their current price, i.e. $670K per mile of state road vs what they currently cost at over $2 million, then open bid the work out to private contractors who will happily do the work , and will most likely do a better job anyway. $670,000 is comparable with the next highest cost state in the country, MA, which has the same number of miles of state roads as NJ, so it’s still not great (we’re 12X te national average), but better than what we pay today. Then merge the $17 billion outstandiung debt of the Transportation Fund into NJ’s genearl obligation fund and disband the Transporation Fund, which is nothing more than a black hole of greed and corrpution where Senators Sarlo and Sweeney deal out patronage to their buddies at Sanzari and the iron workers union. It’s open defrauding of taxpayers, in plain daylight, and they must be stopped.
Talk about patronage job you should see who you Governor has hire in his administration.Do a little research 9:28
10:38, this post is about the NJ Transportation Fund which is $17bn in debt with no end in sight because no one in Trenton is asking why they charge 12x the national average. That’s why Sarlo and Sweeney want to raise our gasoline taxes. What the hell are you talking about? Do us all a little favor, and keep on topic and stop trolling. Are you implying that you favor the way the Transportation Fund steals money from taxpayers? Why would that be, hmmmm? You probably also agree with the union sanctioned plan to raise state income taxes by 29% and the NJ sales tax by 10%, nice.