After all the anguish, NJ’s gas tax increase tip-toes into law


Remember all the New Jersey road projects shut down, the construction workers laid off, the games of political one-upmanship between the Democrat leaders in the Assembly and Senate, and the governor beseeching Grover Norquist for a tax-hike dispensation?  


What it all produced in the end was a ‘compromise’ bill so unpalatable to so many that the governor had to sign it without any ceremony on Friday afternoon.  


Here’s how Bill Orr of Blue Jersey sees it:


“On a quiet Friday afternoon our government often
issues releases announcing actions for which it does not want to attract
attention. Normally an important bipartisan bill would be signed in a public
ceremony with the Governor, the Assembly Speaker, the Senate President, other
legislators, guests, and the press in attendance. Such could have happened
Thursday when legislators were in Trenton. That did not happen. Instead
Christie signed the TTF bill quietly into law on Friday with no ceremony.

“It’s not surprising that
legislators shied away from attending a ceremony. The signed bill provides
essential and substantial funding for the TTF for eight years but comes after
considerable unpopularity from the public, acrimonious wrangling, and a long
delay.

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“The public was not enthused with
either the 23 cent per gallon increase in the gas tax nor the long work
stoppage this summer on transportation projects after the fund ran out of
money. Conservative legislators want to shrink, not grow the state coffers with
an increased tax. Progressive legislators particularly disliked ending the
estate tax and were concerned with other tax policy changes which leave a hole in future state budgets. The governor
insisted on tax policy changes which led to delays and acrimony in reaching an
agreement. 


“It was not fun watching the sausage being made in secret between the Governor, Assembly Leader,
and Senate President. As a supporter of the imploding Donald Trump and in
receipt of a summons accusing him of Official Misconduct, our embattled
governor has little appetite for appearing before the press.

“So our politicians did not want to
put on party hats and toot the horns yesterday.

“The gas tax increase takes effect
November 15. The governor also lifted the executive order shutting down
statewide “nonessential” construction projects. There will be a referendum on
the Nov. 8 ballot to dedicate the new gas tax revenue solely to transportation
projects.”

You can see how legislators voted on the bill here.


Other news coverage:

Christie signs bill raising N.J. gas tax 23 cents a gallon
N.J. gas tax to rise 23 cents a gallon on Nov. 1
23 cent gas tax hike deal will open new budget hole 

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The defense asks judge to drop all Bridgegate charges

The federal judge in the Bridgegate trial was asked during an abbreviated session on Friday to drop all the charges against Port Authority employees Bill Baroni and Bridget Anne Kelly. The judge will take the weekend to decide. NJTV NEWS reporter David Cruz has the details above.


Also covering the trial, Paul Berger of The Record reports:

For the second time at the Bridgegate federal trial in Newark, a defense lawyer has insinuated that Governor Christie was told about the lane closures at the George Washington Bridge before and during the scheme — to cause traffic as a form of political retribution — played out on the streets of Fort Lee in 2013.


Christie, who is not on trial in the case, maintains that he did not find out that his deputy chief of staff, Bridget Anne Kelly, was involved in the September 13 lane closures until months later.

Her lawyer, Michael Critchley, suggests otherwise.

Questioning the governor’s former chief counsel, Charlie McKenna, on Friday morning, Critchley asked: “Were you aware she had conversations with the governor before the lane closures and during the lane closures?”

McKenna replied: “No.”

“Were you aware if Bridget Kelly’s knowledge of what Governor Christie knew — if it ever came out — it would be damaging to his presidential campaign and it would affect the Christie Administration Bridgegate coverup?” Critchley asked.

“I didn’t know,” McKenna responded.

The exchange came on the seventeenth day of the trial of Kelly and Bill Baroni, the governor’s former top executive appointee at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, the agency that owns and operates the bridge.

Critchley raised the same assertions about the governor earlier this week while questioning Deborah Gramiccioni, a former Christie ally who replaced Baroni as deputy executive director of the Port Authority. Gramiccioni said that she had no knowledge of such conversations between Kelly and Christie.


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Some utilities–like PSEG–are rethinking business model


Some states are successfully using ‘decoupling’ as a way to get power companies to convince customers to use less energy — without taking an economic hit

Ralph Izzo, chairman, CEO,
and president of PSEG

Tom Johnson reports for NJ Spotlight:


If the state is going to be more successful in cutting energy use and saving consumers money in the process, it needs to revamp its business model for utilities, according to New Jersey’s most prominent energy executive.
In a keynote address on the state’s evolving energy needs, Ralph Izzo, the chairman, president, and CEO of Public Service Enterprise Group, offered the company’s most expansive plea to date to develop a new regulatory model to encourage utilities to more aggressively invest in energy-efficient technology.
Izzo suggested that Public Service Electric & Gas, the state’s oldest and largest utility as well as PSEG’s most profitable business, is interested pursuing an overhaul of the century-old utility system.
Talks to that effect are now occurring in Trenton among a wide-ranging legislative task force, but similar efforts in the past have proved fruitless. Still, utilities are increasingly being squeezed financially by an array of changes sweeping the sector — declining energy use; increased reliance on cleaner and more localized energy sources, such as solar; and demands for better reliability.
“Meeting new expectations will require utilities to evolve,’’ Izzo said. “Energy efficiency is what the customers need… and we want to make it easy for them to get it.’’
Twenty-nine states already have embraced one new utility model in some form, a system dubbed “decoupling’’ in energy jargon. According to Izzo, “It seems to be a promising way to help make that (energy efficiency) happen.’’

Read the full story here

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Star-Ledger’s Tom Moran says: Give fracking a chance

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The columnist and chief editorial writer for New Jersey’s largest newspaper–the Star-Ledger–says give fracking a chance (with tighter regulations).  His    column, reproduced below, has already generated 61 comments. Give it a read and let us know what you think. To do so, click the tiny ‘comments’ line at the bottom of this post.

Climate change is why environmentalists must reconsider fracking | Moran

By  Tom Moran | Star-Ledger Editorial Board

The Sierra Club, like most environmental groups, vehemently opposes fracking for natural gas, and building pipelines to send it to market.
But it’s time for them to take a fresh look. PSEG announced last week that it will close two enormous coal plants, one near Trenton and the other in Jersey City. By switching to natural gas, carbon emissions will drop by about half.
Why did PSEG make this decision? Mainly because it’s now cheaper to run a power plant on natural gas, thanks to the abundant supplies produced by fracking.
Power companies across the country are making the same decision, with coal burning dropping by 9 percent this year alone. This transition has actually dropped power plants behind transportation as the largest source of carbon emissions for the first time in 1979 — a significant step in the greatest environmental challenge we face.
No doubt, fracking presents two big risks. The process calls for pumping chemicals into the ground to force out the natural gas, and that puts water supplies at risk. And leaks of methane, a gas that is an even more potent risk to the climate than carbon, can undercut the gains of this switch.
But those risks can be managed with vigorous regulation. The Obama administration has found only a few isolated cases of water contamination, and believes the methane leaks are not big enough to outweigh the clear advantages of switching to natural gas. It is studying ways to further reduce both risks with more strict oversight.
The fight against climate change is a desperate one that we are losing. Even if all nations honor the ambitious pledges made during the Paris talks in 2015, scientists say it will be only a start, and that much more must be done to avert catastrophe.
Yes, the ultimate challenge is to wean ourselves off fossil fuels entirely. And a hefty carbon tax is the best way to start. But Washington isn’t close to doing that.
Even when they do wake up, as they will have to eventually, a carbon tax would not suddenly end our reliance on all fossil fuels. It would take years, probably decades.
We need to bring a fanatic realism to this fight, and that means taking every step we can to reduce carbon emissions now. Including fracking.
So let’s not end fracking just yet.   61 Comments
More: Tom Moran columns

Tom Moran may be reached at tmoran@starledger.com or call (973) 836-4909. Follow him on Twitter @tomamoran. Find NJ.com Opinion on Facebook.


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Bridgegate: Prosecution rests case on infamous email

Bill Baroni and  Bridget Anne Kelly  – DANIELLE PARHIZKARAN/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

































Paul Berger reports for The Record:


After almost four weeks of testimony, prosecutors wrapped up their case against two former allies of Governor Christie by calling an FBI agent to testify that she was unable to find several crucial emails between a former aide to Christie and the admitted mastermind of the George Washington Bridge lane closures.


Special Agent Michelle Pickels testified in federal court in Newark on Thursday that she had a copy of the emails between the governor’s former deputy chief of staff, Bridget Anne Kelly, taken from bridge plotter David Wildstein’s email account.

An in-depth look at the scandal over the lane closures at the George Washington Bridge and related aftershocks. Click here to launch.

But Pickels said that when she searched Kelly’s Yahoo account, she could not locate those same emails. The missing messages included the now-infamous August 2013 email from Kelly to Wildstein, first reported by The Record: “Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee.”


Asked why she could not find those emails, Pickels responded: “I could not tell.”

Jurors were presented with the evidence immediately after watching video of a combative appearance by Kelly’s co-defendant, Bill Baroni, in 2013, before a legislative committee probing the lane closures.


Lawyers for Baroni, the former deputy executive director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, had fought to keep the video out of the trial.

The recording showed Baroni testify that Fort Lee unfairly benefited from having three access lanes to the congested bridge and that the lane reductions, over five mornings in September 2013, were part of a legitimate traffic study.

Over the course of about 1½ hours, Baroni comes under sustained interrogation in the video from a panel of angry and deeply skeptical lawmakers led by Assemblyman John Wisniewski, D-Middlesex.


Baroni and Kelly, both 44, are accused of reducing the lanes from three to one to punish the mayor of Fort Lee for refusing to endorse the governor’s 2013 reelection bid.

The mayor, Mark Sokolich, and his police chief, Keith Bendul, testified earlier in the trial that the closures caused gridlock in their town, severely delaying commuters, school buses and first responders. Both men said that their repeated phone calls and messages requesting relief from the Port Authority during the week of the closures went unreturned and unheeded.


During the legislative testimony, Baroni stated that the lanes from Fort Lee constituted 25 percent of the access to the upper level of the bridge but were used almost exclusively by Fort Lee residents, constituting less than 5 percent of bridge traffic. Previously, the jury heard from Port Authority traffic specialists that 25 percent of vehicles on the upper level used the three Fort Lee lanes, many of them originating from other North Jersey towns.


Baroni also told lawmakers that the lane reductions were requested by leaders of the Port Authority Police Benevolent Association. Earlier this week, the jury heard Officers Paul Nunziato and Mike DeFillipis testify that Baroni asked them to falsely state that the lane reductions were their idea. The two testified that they had refused.


Exchanges in the video between Baroni and Wisniewski were particularly tense, with both men disagreeing, talking over and making cutting comments toward each other. Wisniewski complimented Baroni several times on his “valiant” attempts to dodge questions.

At one point, Baroni offered to take Wisniewski on a field trip to look at access lanes to the Lincoln Tunnel.


“Come on. I’ll even pack your lunch,” Baroni said.

“I would want to get it tested first,” Wisniewski responded.

Read the full story here

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Judge finds probable cause in GWB complaint vs. Christie


Salvador Rizzo reports in The Record:


Governor Christie may have broken New Jersey law during the George Washington Bridge lane closures, a municipal court judge ruled Thursday.

Judge Roy F. McGeady of Bergen County found probable cause that Christie engaged in official misconduct during the 2013 lane closures and issued a summons for the governor to appear Oct. 24.  


An in-depth look at the scandal over the lane closures at the George Washington Bridge and related aftershocks. Click here to launch.

Probable cause is a relatively low bar in the legal system that allows law enforcement agencies to search, charge or arrest individuals suspected of wrongdoing, but it is not enough to prove guilt.

Christie said through a spokesman that he is appealing the ruling immediately and that the citizen who filed the court complaint against him is “a political activist with a history of abusing the judicial system.”
It is now up to the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office to decide whether to pursue an indictment against Christie. A spokeswoman for acting Bergen County Prosecutor Gurbir S. Grewal, a Christie appointee, declined to comment Thursday.

For years, Christie has denied any knowledge of the plot to close Fort Lee access lanes to the world’s busiest bridge. But lawyers for the prosecution and the defense in the ongoing Bridgegate trial have cast doubt on Christie’s assertions.

A former political operative for Christie who plotted the scheme, David Wildstein, testified in federal court that he discussed the lane closures with the governor during a Sept. 11 memorial ceremony at Ground Zero, while a massive traffic jam was paralyzing Fort Lee. Christie has said he does not recall Wildstein’s comments.

Wildstein is the main witness for the prosecution and says he is cooperating with U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman’s investigation in part because he hopes to avoid prison.

A former firefighter from Teaneck, Bill Brennan, filed a complaint against Christie in municipal court based on Wildstein’s testimony.
Brennan argues that Christie engaged in official misconduct because he should have reversed the lane closures once he became aware of them. Under state law, official misconduct is punishable by five to 10 years in prison.

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