New Jersey on Monday reported another nine confirmed COVID-19 deaths and 8,831 confirmed positive cases, which despite breaking a streak of five-digit tallies, coincided with the highest seven-day case average ever recorded and a surge in hospitalizations.
While the number of cases reported Monday is much lower, nearly 30%, from the previous day, it’s probably due to fewer tests being conducted over the holidays and a delay in getting results processed and reported to the state. The state’s seven-day case average, at 12,237, is the highest ever recorded. It’s more than double the average a week ago and is more than 500% percent higher than this time last month.
Numbers in the Garden State have been on a record-breaking tear as the omicron variant has surged, cold weather has driven people indoors, and demand for testing has spiked ahead of holiday gatherings. Monday marks the twelfth straight day in which the state has reported more than 6,000 new positive tests a day.
Before last week, the previous daily record for reported cases was 6,922 on Jan. 13. Then, on Wednesday, the state reported 9,711 confirmed cases. Case tallies climbed to five-digit figures for the next four consecutive days before today’s drop.
NJ Republican State Senator Joe Pennacchio said a $53 million settlement to the families of veterans home residents who died “due to the tragic decisions of the Murphy administration” demonstrates the need for a comprehensive investigation and legislative oversight hearings.
NJ State Senator Joe Pennacchio
“New Jerseyans are once again paying for the mismanagement of the pandemic by the Murphy administration,” said Senator Joe Pennacchio (R-26). “After 10,000 nursing and veterans home residents paid with their lives, millions of New Jersey taxpayers will be forced to pay with their wallets to settle claims of negligence and incompetence made against the administration. The settlement is yet another attempt by the Murphy administration to prevent a full and transparent investigation into the tragic decisions that led thousands of preventable deaths.”
According to published reports, the Murphy administration confirmed it will pay $52.9 million to settle claims with 119 families of veterans home residents whose deaths were attributed to the coronavirus at the start of the pandemic.
“A handful of the mourning families may be satisfied with a monetary settlement, but there are thousands more who would rather have answers,” said Pennacchio. “At every turn, however, the Murphy administration has resisted the efforts of grieving families, legislators, and the press to understand why so many of our frail and elderly veterans and nursing home residents died needlessly.”
In May of 2020, Pennacchio said he exposed deadly orders issued by the Murphy administration that forced nursing homes to accept COVID-positive patients from hospitals. The directives from the Department of Health prohibited long-term care facilities from testing patients for COVID-19 prior to admission.
To understand why those and other disastrous orders were issued, Pennacchio introduced a resolution that, if adopted, would convene an investigative “Senate Select Committee on the Executive Branch’s Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic.”
Senate Democrats blocked his efforts to bring the resolution, SR68, up for a vote by the New Jersey Senate on five separate occasions over 19 months. Earlier this week, every single Democrat in the chamber voted to table Pennacchio’s latest attempt to call a vote on the resolution during a Senate session on December 20.
On December 6, Pennacchio voted remotely from the parking lot of the Paramus Veterans Memorial Home to highlight the Democrats’ continuing efforts to block the investigation with subpoena power he has been calling for.
“Sadly, Democrats in the Legislature have been fully complicit in this cover-up,” said Pennacchio. “Democrats initially agreed to join us in a bipartisan investigation, but that quickly changed when the Murphy administration pressured them not to start digging. It’s disappointing Democrats showed none of the courage of the veterans whose deaths they refuse to investigate. I’ll keep pushing for a thorough, bipartisan investigation for as long as it takes.”
Pennacchio noted that Governor Murphy isn’t even in the country to answer questions as news of the multi-million-dollar settlement was shared with the press at the start of a holiday weekend when few people would be watching.
“Governor Murphy is on another vacation and families still don’t have the answers they deserve,” added Pennacchio. “One week he’s off to his luxury villa in Italy, now he’s jet-setting to Costa Rica. You know who isn’t going on vacation? The 10,000 American heroes he sentenced to death in our veterans and nursing homes.”
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TRENTON, N.J. – School districts and institutions of higher education must adopt policies protecting students’ freedom of expression under legislation sponsored by Assemblyman Hal Wirths and signed by Governor Phil Murphy on Tuesday.
The legislation (A169 / S108) gives student journalists in public schools, as well as public colleges and universities, the right to determine the content of school-sponsored media like newspapers and blogs, and exercise freedom of speech.
NJ Assemblyman Hal Wirths
“Student journalists often serve as important watchdogs by holding those in power accountable for their actions. Unfortunately, school-sponsored media is more easily censored,” Wirths (R-Sussex) said. “This new law upholds the principles of the First Amendment. Free student press gives budding journalists a platform to share stories that should not be suppressed.”
Except in cases where a story is libelous, obscene, incites violence or constitutes an unwarranted invasion of privacy, student reporters have the right to free speech under the law.
“We live in a world where it is all too easy to tune out differing or uncomfortable opinions or viewpoints, but it is critical to a free society that we allow everyone to express themselves. We should never be afraid to print the truth and should always encourage the freedom of press,” Wirths added.
Under the law, schools must have a written policy concerning students’ right to free speech in place by the first full school year after enactment.
TRENTON – In an effort to improve New Jersey’s energy and water efficiency, earlier this week the Senate advanced legislation sponsored by Senator Bob Smith, which would establish minimum energy and water efficiency standards for appliances sold in the State.
The bill, S3324, would require certain products sold, offered for sale or leased in the state to meet or exceed efficiency standards. The energy and water efficiency standards in the bill would be based on various sources including specifications from federal programs such as ENERGY STAR and WaterSense, and from criteria developed and adopted by the California Energy Commission.
“By 2050, our goal as a state is to greatly diminish our emissions, and this bill will bring us one step closer to achieving that goal,” said Senator Smith (D-Middlesex / Somerset). “These new standards will not only help us decrease how much harmful emissions we emit, but we can help both homeowners and the State conserve water and electricity, ensuring consumers will save money over time by remaining efficient. Higher efficiency standards for our products will be a great asset for our residents and the environment.”
Products regulated under the bill would include goods such as new air purifiers, certain fluorescent lamps, certain commercial kitchen appliances, computers, monitors, showerheads, toilets, urinals, portable electric spas, residential ventilating fans, and water coolers.
The bill was released from the Senate by a vote of 26-13.
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Climate activists in New York City Hall Park demonstrating in favor of a ban on natural gas in new buildings on Wednesday. Photo by Dieu-Nalio Chéry for the New York Times
The question of whether to restrict the use of natural gas has become part of America’s culture wars.
This month, New York City moved to ban gas hookups in new buildings, joining cities in blue states like California, Massachusetts and Washington that want to shift homes away from burning natural gas because it releases carbon dioxide, which causes global warming. Instead, developers in New York City will have to install electric heat pumps and electric kitchen ranges in newly constructed buildings.
But the growing push to electrify homes has triggered a political backlash: At least 20 mostly red states including Arizona, Georgia, Florida, Ohio and Texas have passed laws that forbid their cities from restricting gas use. Most of these bills have passed in the last year, backed by the natural gas industry and local gas utilities.
Quotable: “The message was: ‘You don’t want these California liberals telling you that you can’t have a gas stove,’” said Mary Boren, an Oklahoma state senator, describing the reaction to proposed restrictions in her state.
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