Jerry Green - Ledger - Editorial: Chair's lame excuse

Published in the Star-Ledger, Saturday, June 2, 2007

[Editorial]
The chairman's lame excuse

Don't blame me, says Assemblyman Jerry Green, a Union County Democrat. He's not blocking a bill that would save taxpayers a cool $1 million annually by cutting a few unneeded patronage jobs at county tax boards.

Oh no, Green wants us to believe the stall is the fault of the bill's Republican sponsors. Green says they haven't pushed him hard enough to get the measure on the schedule for consideration by his Assembly Housing and Local Government Commit tee.

Ridiculous. Last we checked, legislative committee chairmen can bring up any bill they want. And Green and Assembly Speaker Joe Roberts (D-Camden) and every other lawmaker should want this bill. It reverses the Legislature's wasteful creation of new tax board jobs three years ago, at the very time the volume of tax appeals and other work of the boards was dropping to 15-year lows.

As Green himself says, this is a good-government bill. But if he and his colleagues don't stop pussyfooting and start chopping these pension-padding positions for political hacks, their idea of good government will be clear.

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