"PRINCETON TOWNSHIP, N.J. - Yet another round of budget talks ended without agreement last night, and New Jersey officials continued to roll out an unprecedented shutdown of state services.
Gov. Corzine, who ordered the shutdown Saturday after the state missed its deadline to approve a new spending plan, called Democratic legislative leaders who have blocked his proposed increase in the sales tax to a late afternoon summit at Drumthwacket, the governor's mansion. He said he was "prepared to stay 24 hours" to end the budget standoff that already has halted the state lottery, road construction, and other government activities.
"There is no immediate prospect of a budget on my desk that I can sign," Corzine said as he left a communications center for the New Jersey State Police yesterday morning. "This is not about making nice. This is about doing the right thing."
Little changed during the day. Corzine's meeting with legislators broke up around 8:45 p.m. with no accord in sight.
As he left Drumthwacket, Assembly Speaker Joseph Roberts (D., Camden), who has led the opposition to a higher sales tax, said the meeting had been "very productive. We are going to meet again tomorrow."
But in a news conference a little later, little progress was reported by Senate President Richard J. Codey; Assemblyman Joseph Cryan, the state Democratic chairman; and Tom Shea, Corzine's chief of staff.
"I would say very little if any," Codey said, "and I would say that's very sad for the state."
You can bet this is NOT what the DNC envisioned. A Democratically-controlled State 4.5 Billion dollars in the red and shut down, at a time when they are singing, "Anything you can do WE can do better..."
Then this little tidbit:
"Assembly Democrats who have balked at Corzine's proposal to raise the sales tax from 6 percent to 7 percent met behind closed doors yesterday afternoon at the Statehouse, reviewing spending plans before decamping to Drumthwacket.
The majority-party Democrats were standing firm in their opposition to the Democratic governor's $30.9 billion spending plan, Budget Committee Chairman Louis Greenwald (D., Camden) said.
"We're on the verge of shutting down casinos and parks because the governor is saying people aren't paying enough," he said. "I think they're paying too much already."
Want to know what life under Democrats means? Get out your wallet and start forking you're hard-earned dough over to the Government. Cozine has been in office less than six-months and began to attempt to raise taxes from day one.
Nuff said.
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