Blue Jersey - Recommended Diaries

Proposition 13-- Jersey Style

tabbycat31 — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 21:22:20 GMT

On Tuesday, Governor Christie will propose a constitutional amendment that would limit property tax increases to 2.5% per year. http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2010/03/christie_will_propose_constitu.html While on paper this seems like a good idea, it immediately reminded me of another good idea at the time that is backfiring today—California’s Proposition 13. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Proposition_13_(1978)

California, a state notorious for ballot initiatives, passed Proposition 13 in 1978 in order to help people stay in their long-term homes that they could no longer afford due to rising property taxes. Proposition 13 limits taxes to 1% of a property’s assessed value, which under the proposition is only allowed to increase a maximum of 2% per year. Under this proposition, long time homeowners pay a lower property tax bill than their new neighbors. On paper it is a good idea, but the long-term effects are devastating. Proposition 13 also treats businesses and commercial properties the same as homeowners.

Of course with Christie’s proposal, the devil is in the details. Unlike Proposition 13, Christie’s proposal does not address the fluctuation in real estate prices (that I know about). What would a housing bubble and burst such as the recent one do to Christie’s proposal? This leaves me with more questions than answers. Services such as public schools, police, fire, public libraries, and infrastructure have been cut because of decreasing revenue. Especially after the recent storms that New Jersey had this winter, do we really want to gut first responders and infrastructure repair?

Of course now issues like Proposition 13 are not new. California’s financial problems make New Jersey look like a fiscal genius. The budget problems that California faces today can be linked back to Proposition 13. http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1904938,00.html The proposition also dramatically impacted the state’s per pupil educational spending, which is currently 48th in the nation and California’s public schools have suffered. http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1907504,00.html?iid=sphere-inline-sidebar

Now that there is a case study for how Proposition 13 affects the government over the long term, it makes no sense that yet another state would adapt this model. This proposed constitutional amendment is not fiscally responsibl. When the budget is debated between Christie and the Democrats in the legislature, I hope that the Democrats bring up the long-term effects of Proposition 13 on California. This is not a time for the Democrats to act like spineless wimps and they should fight this every step of the way. I’m a recent transplant to New Jersey and I see it as a perfect fit for me. However if Chris Christie has his way, I may have to reconsider in the long-term, as will many New Jerseyans.

Hudson Jail Hunger Strike Among Immigrant Detainees Over Phone Charges

kwilkinson — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 18:59:27 GMT

Nina Bernstein of the NY Times hits the nail on the head in her article describing a hunger strike in Hudson County jail among immigrant detainees, recently moved into Hudson after the closure of Manhattan's Varick Street detention center. Communication with lawyers, family and friends is difficult, if not impossible, and they are being gouged by phone charges.

Move Across Hudson Further Isolates Immigration Detainees
When federal authorities shut down New York City's only immigration detention center last month, and sent most of its detainees to a county jail in New Jersey over protests by their advocates, Obama administration officials stressed that the jail was only a short drive from the city. But under a contract with a private telephone company, calls to detainees' families and lawyers back in New York are decidedly long distance. The result is a 800 percent increase in the cost of a call, to more than 89 cents a minute, in a phone system so cumbersome that detainees say it impedes their ability to contest deportation or contact relatives. In protest, the detainees have sent appeals for help to the American Bar Association, signed by more than 180 detainees, and have threatened a hunger strike. They cite exorbitant telephone costs as their central grievance, but also complain of poor health care, confiscation of legal documents and mistreatment by guards at the jail, the Hudson County Correctional Center in Kearny.

The county response is carefully phrased (bolding mine):

"No one is unwilling to listen to these concerns and to make sure that detainees are treated with respect and dignity," said James Kennelly, a spokesman for Hudson County and the jail. "We take the care and custody of the detainees very seriously."

This same spokesman told the Jersey Journal on March 1st in response to our complaints over a 90 day update rule for visitors lists - the rule delayed by months visits to our former Middlesex detainees and prevented us from visiting some of the detainees at all:

"That was clearly miscommunication that we regret," said county spokesman Jim Kennelly about the 90-day message. "We don't want anyone in the detainee population or advocates for them thinking that we are trying to limit their access."

We weren't just thinking they were trying to limit our access. Our access was very clearly limited. They claim they've stopped limiting the detainees' lists to 5 visitors. And that was the part I got to respond to, without seeing his exact quote first:

"Hudson County jail realized how arbitrary and unjust it was to limit detainees to visiting lists of five people," said Karina Wilkinson, co-founder of Middlesex County Coalition for Immigration Rights. "That is a small piece of a huge problem. Immigrant detainees continue to be denied access to the community, lawyers and family."

And if you weren't born here, or can't prove it, beware of which side of the street you ride your bike on, from the Times article. It can mean life or death ICE issued press releases on two more deaths in detention in the last 5 days, a 36 year old Liberian woman and a 68 year old Guatemalan. Remind me why we're detaining 68 year old men in detention centers with inadequate medical care?

One detainee who signed the petition is Orville Wayne Allen, 47, a longtime New York State resident who has spent more than 19 months in immigration custody without seeing an immigration judge, his fiancée, Desiree Williams, said. When a police officer in Mount Vernon stopped him for riding a bicycle on the wrong side of a street in 2008, she said, a database check turned up an order of deportation in absentia from the 1980s, something a lawyer had supposedly resolved years before.
Ms. Williams, who works weekdays, has not seen him since he was transferred last month, because the jail allows only weekday visits.

ICE detention standards clearly provide for weekend and holiday visits. They are just unwilling to impose these standards on the county jails, even while they are paying over $12 million into Hudson county coffers, of federal tax dollars that could be better spent, if ICE would just review on a case by case basis who actually poses a flight risk or danger. Mandatory detention has to end. For more info about the national campaign, including about a hunger strike in Texas, go to the Dignity Not Detention website.

Jersey activists storm the Hill to demand ENDA vote

Jay Lassiter — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 20:20:54 GMT

Promoted by Jason Springer

(Washington D.C.)--

Fifty Garden State activists just descended on the nation's capital to lobby our Congressional delegation to pass the Employment Non Discrimination Act and provide LGBT folks with legal protection in the workplace. Presently it's perfectly legal to fire someone for being gay in 29 states. It's worse for transgendered Americans who are unprotected in 38 states. Passing ENDA would make it illegal to an employee based on his/her sexual orientation or gender identity.
There are thirteen members of the NJ House delegation and we'll be lobbying all of them (+Lautenberg and Menendez) to vote for equality. In a nutshell, the plan is to "run up the score" with pro-equality votes in places like New Jersey to provide all Americans with the same protections LGBTs have in our state.

Thankfully there is hope that several members of the Jersey GOP House members are considering an equality vote on ENDA, as well. We'll be lobbying them all. Even Scott Garrett.

Today's Jersey ENDA caravan was organized locally by Garden State Equality in conjunction with the National Center of Transgender Equality. You can help by calling your Congressman to tell him the ENDA vote is important to you. Do it tonight and fill their voicemail box with supportive sentiments. Better yet, do it TOMORROW while we're making office visits. The capital switchboard awaits your call at 202-224-2131.