shutdown
TRENTON, New Jersey (AP) --
After Gov. Jon S. Corzine ordered nonessential government services shut down Saturday amid a bitter intraparty budget dispute, the lottery and some road construction projects were the first to go.
State beaches, parks and campgrounds were to stay open through the July Fourth holiday. But should the impasse extend beyond Tuesday, they too would be added to the list of closed attractions.
Atlantic City's 12 casinos require state monitoring, but lawyers for the casino industry were challenging the closing order in court. The state would lose an estimated $2 million in tax revenue every day the casinos are shut.
The core issue? A penny. Corzine wants to raise the state sales tax from 6% to 7%, but state legislators are balking.
New Jersey is inarguably one of the, if not THE, most expensive state to live in. A home for $100k anywhere else would sell for more than twice that here and its taxes in many counties would be over 5 grand. Our auto insurance is the highest in the nation.
Our government is famous for its corruptions at all levels; I would not be surprised if NJ held some sort of record for the most mayors sent to jail.
Corzine's campaign promises were worthless, starting with the day after his inauguration, when he announced an increase in gas taxes.
The shutdown means, essentially, that anything and everything that the state backs will cease. This includes the lottery, Atlantic City casinos, park services, welfare, etc. The part about being allowed to keep state workers working with no pay is incredulous to me. Who'd volunteer for that duty?
Personally, I've had it with this state. We can't afford to live here at all; major companies that used to make NJ home are outsourcing or moving, making job searching futile for those like my husband, who are tradespeople dependent on corporations in need of the services. We've become a state of malls-ironic since retail doesn't exactly pay enough to afford living here. We're a distinctly divided state, between the haves and have-nots and the have-nots are growing faster.
I can't even say with certainty that NJ is overly partisan; although Corzine and his predecessor, the famously disgraced McGreevey, are both Dems (neither of which I cared for at all) and NJ normally follows a Democratic majority.
This is probably more of a rant than a debate(feel free, though to knock NJ, etc) ; just be glad if you don't reside here and if you do, check out your options of moving. Just don't use the toll roads-they're probably closed.
