As the state continues to struggle with a crushing insolvency and its powerful teachers union, the NJEA, pulls out all the stops to try to forestall the inevitable landing of the reality on their members that those in the private sector have lived in for years, NJ voters delivered a strong rebuke to municipal school budgets today.
Selling school budgets in New Jersey, a state unusual in the sheer madness of the number of school districts and their attendant overlap, redundancies, and inefficiencies it has, was never easy. Now, given the state’s implosion and the stunning ejection of Jon "Goldman Sacs" Corzine , it’s even harder.
"New Jersey voters took a stand on school spending and property taxes today, rejecting 198 of 358 school budgets across 14 counties, according to early and unofficial results in statewide school elections."
Reports the Star-Ledger
"If the trend continues, it would mark the most budget defeats since 1976, when 56 percent of the failed. Typically, more than 70 percent of budgets are approved."
The governor, Chris Christie, while a pariah of the powerful NJEA and the object of countless slurs and hate comments on state blogs and websites – to the point that a Bergen school official wished him dead (!) – was able to tap into voter outrage at perceived waste and bloat in school budgets in the face of rampant private sector unemployment in the state.
Tonight, it’s looking more like the state teachers’ and school boards' gravy trains continue to screech to halt – running into the same harsh realities that private sector citizens have endured for the past few years.
One thing is for sure; don’t expect the heated debate on either side to cool down any time soon.