The New Jersey Transportation Trust Fund is nearly broke.

AAAWorld ^ | Angelina Sciolla

[Pete-R-Bilt]

When states make severe bad management decisions, they generally make us pay to bail them out.

don't let them, tell your reps in washington to delete the tolling amendment or at least not to toll existing lanes, of the highway bill.

[Pete-R-Bilt]

ping for smooth roads and no tolls

[Pete-R-Bilt]

Part - 2

http://www.aaaworld.com/pages/articles.asp?id=429

[Brilliant]

Texas, Michigan, Philadelphia and New York City are among the states and cities now facing a transportation crisis. This problem is bigger than New Jersey. It’s national.

No. It's not national. It's Texas, Michigan, Philadelphia, NYC and New Jersey. Those are rich places that don't need national help, and the statement that it is a national problem is just evidence how they got into this problem. They don't take responsibility for their own goof ups.

[NonValueAdded]

Trust Fund, yeah "Hey, you blanked up, you trusted us!"

[Mark was here]

No. It's not national. It's Texas, Michigan, Philadelphia, NYC and New Jersey. Those are rich places that don't need national help, and the statement that it is a national problem is just evidence how they got into this problem. They don't take responsibility for their own goof ups.

Michigan is a DONER STATE - we send more to Washington in taxes then we get back. The solution is not sending money to Washington in the first place.

[Pete-R-Bilt]

altho the states dig thier own holes as to how they do or don't manage thier roads and bridges the highway system as a whole is seriously in need of repair.

thus the system condition is a national problem

[kublia khan]

Perhaps some of the money we've p*****d away on AMTRRAK and the Space Shuttle would have been better spent on transportation solutions that people actually use.

[still_learning]

The State of New Jersey should be allowed to sell special long term bonds to provide bridge financing. These bonds would only be allow to be purchased by the Social Security Trust Fund (Lock Box).

When any politician names anything with 'trust' remember that simply means he ain't going to be around when you find out the piggy bank is empty.

[sportutegrl]

I am a recent transplant from the south to the northeast. I can't figure out how these stupid, (yes, stupid) yankees have got in place a tax that: pollutes the environment, causes you to sit idling your car waiting to comply, makes you late for work, wastes fuel energy, causes me to drive miles out of my way on Highway 1 to avoid the $5 per car toll to cross the bridge on I-95. Back home in Louisiana, we could cross any bridge across the Mississippi for free, including the free ferries. You don't idle your car spewing pollutants and burning fuel to pay sales tax.

[B4Ranch]

Politicians who 'give' the voters everything in an attempt to be re-elected need to be held for their decisions. The financial management of public facilities must be observed by all involved. Fiscal projections are not to be forecast lightly. Financial officers should be required to make public all of their projections because this is public funding. Annual evaluations and corrections should be taken to insure continued success.

The pending bankruptcy is the result of repeated years of poor financial management. Someone or some comittee kept the truth from the public. These are the people who need to be held accountable for the loss. It was not the result of ignorance, that I can assure you.

[Brilliant]

It's no more in need of repair now than it has been, though.

[mware]

They don't call it EASY-MONEY,,errr I mean PASS for nothing.

[Brilliant]

There aren't very many states that aren't donor states, and most of those which aren't donor states get just barely more than they send. A few states like NM get substantially more than they send, but it's only because they don't send hardly anything because they are very poor states to begin with.

On the other hand, D.C. gets vastly more money than it sends. VA and MD get some of the spillover, so they get more than they send. That is really where the loss is. D.C. spends the bulk of the tax money, and the rest of us are paying for it.

It's another good reason for not making DC a state. They've got more than adequate representation as it is. A large number of Congressmen live in DC. And they all work there (if you can call it that).

[Pete-R-Bilt]

you're too kind in your description of the spending habits of the current batch of politicans.

poor management is at the very least an understatement. criminal comes to my mind.

heres is a very small list of pork in tealu the recent figure is 17 billion of the funding is pork

probably much, much more...

Here are a few of the earmarked non-highway projects (along with their congressional beneficiaries):

-- Construction of "Renaissance Square" in Rochester, N.Y., including a performing arts center. $7 million. Rep. Louise Slaughter, a highly partisan liberal Democrat.

-- Renovation of a historic depot and bus station in Jessup, Ga. $1 million. Rep. Jack Kingston, a leading Republican conservative.

-- Improvement of the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Mich. $1.5 million. Rep. John Dingell, the senior member of the House and a fierce Democratic battler.

-- A new parking building in Oak Lawn, Ill. $4 million. Rep. William Lipinski, an 11-term Democrat.

-- A series of improvements for the Blue Ridge Music Center in Galax, Va. $2.5 million. Rep. Rick Boucher, an 11-term Democrat.

guess why NJ's really broke and our roads are falling apart...

[B4Ranch]

"you're too kind in your description of the spending habits of the current batch of politicians."

I am the kind of guy who smiles when corrupt politicians are arrested and you should see my grin when they are convicted. It's almost unerasable!

[Alberta's Child]

Politicians who 'give' the voters everything in an attempt to be re-elected need to be held for their decisions.

From the article . . .

In 1995, a series of amendments to the TTF re-authorization legislation made bonding a permanent policy. Voters in New Jersey agreed in a subsequent referendum."

Oh, well.

I got into a heated discussion about this very subject with a member of the New Jersey state senate at a conference six years ago, and I predicted that the state was going to end up in this mess because he and his fellow legislators didn't have a clue about how to oversee this kind of infrastructure "trust fund."

[XRdsRev]

Here is a list that shows the amount of Federal money that every state gets for every dollar it sends to Washington.

There are 19 "donor states" (shown by a "-" minus sign, they get back less than what they pay in Federal taxes). Connecticut and New Jersey are the two biggest donor states. Florida breaks even (one Federal dollar back in aid for every tax dollar send to Washington). The 30 other states (shown by a "+" plus sign) and the District of Columbia all get more in Federal aid than they pay in taxes.

- California $ 0.86
- Colorado $ 0.85
- Connecticut $ 0.62
- Delaware $ 0.84
- Georgia $ 0.99
- Illinois $ 0.74
- Indiana $ 0.92
- Massachusetts $ 0.86
- Michigan $ 0.81
- Minnesota $ 0.76
- Nevada $ 0.69
- New Hampshire $ 0.71
- New Jersey $ 0.66
- New York $ 0.86
- Ohio $ 0.97
- Oregon $ 0.93
- Texas $ 0.96
- Washington $ 0.87
- Wisconsin $ 0.83

Florida $ 1.00

+ Alabama $ 1.54
+ Alaska $ 1.68
+ Arizona $ 1.18
+ Arkansas $ 1.38
+ Hawaii $ 1.56
+ Idaho $ 1.30
+ Iowa $ 1.04
+ Kansas $ 1.02
+ Kentucky $ 1.41
+ Louisiana $ 1.39
+ Maine $ 1.32
+ Maryland $ 1.32
+ Mississippi $ 1.78
+ Missouri $ 1.26
+ Montana $ 1.59
+ Nebraska $ 1.09
+ New Mexico $ 2.03
+ North Carolina $ 1.06
+ North Dakota $ 1.86
+ Oklahoma $ 1.46
+ Pennsylvania $ 1.06
+ Rhode Island $ 1.18
+ South Carolina $ 1.27
+ South Dakota $ 1.46
+ Tennessee $ 1.20
+ Utah $ 1.06
+ Vermont $ 1.08
+ Virginia $ 1.48
+ West Virginia $ 1.75
+ Wyoming $ 1.09

[Alberta's Child]

Interesting information. It's worth noting that there is one potential aspect of those figures that may skew them. If these figures include Social Security and Medicare outlays, then I would expect that states with more retirees per capita would be somewhat more likely to be "recipient" states.

In any case, there is definitely a noticeable trend there. States in which a large portion of the population lives in urban areas are overwhelmingly "donor" states simply because the higher cost of living drives taxpayers into higher Federal income tax brackets. This is why smaller Northeastern states like New Jersey, Connecticut, and Delaware are among the biggest "donor" states.

[P.O.E.]

Why do politicians spend millions to get a job that pays in the tens of thousands?