By Matt Rooney | The Save Jersey Blog
Today’s the day, Save Jerseyans.
A 78-year old tradition, the “Walk to Washington” sponsored by New Jersey’s Chamber of Commerce is a premiere political event for people who keep track of such things. It features Trenton’s elite navigating the crowded aisles of a southbound train to Washington, D.C. where lobbyists, politicians, operatives and other assorted power-seekers/wielders will huddle at a dinner attended by the state’s federal delegation and headlined by none other than Governor Chris Christie (who, back in 2010, skipped the notoriously decadent trip and dismissed the whole affair as “business as usual”).
This year’s ride is underway right as the same folks attending the trip excitedly warn lecture us that the Transportation Trust Fund is going off the rails.
And yet, there’s precious little attempt to discuss anything serious these days. Assembly Speaker Prieto is refusing an invitation to stand before the voters and debate his Republican counterpart and his transportation chair, John Wisniewski, won’t consider any reforms to how New Jersey manages its roads other than ever-higher gas taxes; over in the Senate, President Sweeney is accusing Republicans of lacking “real solutions.”
I’ve said it before and I’m going to keep saying it, Save Jerseyans: if a state government spends $32.5 billion in a given year but can’t handle road maintenance and pension payments then guess what – something ain’t right! And it isn’t a lack of “revenue.” We wouldn’t accept this insane logic in any other context, would we? For example, a couple grossing $500,000 per year that nevertheless can’t afford bread, milk, or gas is clearly doing something wrong. Right? They’re living outside of their means. Trenton’s plight isn’t fundamentally different.
When it comes to “real” solutions, politicians can huff and puff all they like but it can’t change reality; charts speak louder than words, pitting solutions Ed Sheppard and I have been discussing here against those of the Democrat Majority:
To be fair, I did omit one other idea from Sweeney’s column regarding our corresponding item #8 above; in 2013, he tried to extend project labor agreements to infrastructure projects, beyond the buildings we’re already applying PLA’s to in even wildly inappropriate context, a move by the ironworker chieftain that would’ve exponentially increased road maintenance costs and hastened the fund’s decline. How are we supposed to take admonishment seriously when it comes from a guy who (1) won’t consider solutions other than tax hikes and (2) refuses to address costs? Answer: we cannot.
Real solutions and meaningful compromise could follow from REAL effort. A better use of time than today’s train trip? Trenton’s elite hunkering down for a long weekend, equipped with red pens and cheese pizzas, to cut their way out of a gas tax hike.
