No sure answers for ballot questions

By Jennifer Moroz
Inquirer Trenton Bureau, November 2, 2007

TRENTON - It has been 17 years since New Jersey voters defeated a statewide ballot question, and recent polls suggest the winning trend isn't about to end this year.

But that doesn't mean supporters of this year's initiatives are resting easy. There are a lot of forces working against them.

Voters are being asked to approve $650 million in new borrowing - for open-space preservation and stem-cell research - in a year in which taxpayer frustration and concern about state finances are soaring.

A group advocating smaller government and fiscal conservatism has launched a "Vote No" campaign against both bond issues and a third ballot initiative to dedicate more sales-tax revenue to property-tax reform.

And antiabortion groups are separately - and very vocally - fighting the stem-cell initiative, saying the science it would fund is morally repugnant.

"We're a little nervous," acknowledged Jeff Tittel, director of the New Jersey chapter of the Sierra Club.

That's why Tittel's group has joined forces with dozens of other organizations in an orchestrated effort to persuade voters to approve $200 million in new bonds for the preservation of open space, farmland and historic sites across the state. The money would replenish, for one year, the near-bankrupt Garden State Preservation Trust, until a permanent funding source is found.

Over the last few weeks, the "Keep it Green" campaign has staged a series of events and bombarded the public with flyers and the media with news releases to make sure its message gets across.

Without new funding, the group says, land in the pipeline for preservation is at risk of getting snatched up by developers.

"Every year, we save about 20,000 acres of open space from bulldozers," Tittel said. "Without this money, the bulldozers win."

Voters historically have approved funding for open-space preservation. Indeed, the last time any statewide ballot question was defeated was in 1990, when voters refused to approve $135 million in bonds for affordable housing.

But this year, "we're dealing with historic levels of concern about the New Jersey budget," said "Keep It Green" spokesman John Malay. "You can't take this sort of thing for granted in the climate we have now."

The state is carrying $30 billion in debt, annual payments on which amount to nearly 10 percent of the budget. The pension system is severely underfunded. And Gov. Corzine recently warned that New Jersey faces a deficit of up to $3.5 billion in the forthcoming budget year.

Steve Lonegan, state director of the conservative Americans for Prosperity, insists it would be reckless for the state to borrow any more money. The group has launched a campaign, hitting the public with television ads, phone calls and flyers, attacking both bond initiatives.

"The overriding issue across the board is these conspire to raise taxes and debt in a state that cannot afford it," he said.

Lonegan isn't the only one fighting the stem-cell measure, which would authorize $450 million in bonds to fund research grants over 10 years, piggy-backing on $270 million approved last year for the construction of stem-cell research facilities around the state.

Antiabortion groups argue the public shouldn't be funding research on embryonic stem cells, which they say is morally wrong and hasn't proved to yield results.

The groups have tried and failed to get the courts to agree to remove the measure from the ballot. They said they might still challenge the results of the vote, if the initiative passes.

In the meantime, they are running ads in an attempt to persuade the public to vote it down.

"This has grave consequences for humanity and the personal and financial integrity of New Jersey," said Marie Tasy, executive director of New Jersey Right to Life.

Proponents of the measure, meanwhile, are trying to convince voters that the spending will put New Jersey at the forefront of research they say has the potential to cure now-incurable diseases and change the face of medicine.

"Researchers are going to follow the money. They are going to go to those institutions and states committed to providing dollars for research," said Assemblyman Neil Cohen (D., Union), a prime legislative sponsor of the measure along with Senate President Richard J. Codey (D., Essex).

Corzine, another major backer, isn't just talking up the measure; the former Wall Street CEO is throwing some of his personal fortune behind it. He recently donated $150,000 to New Jersey for Hope, a political action committee formed to promote the ballot question's passage.

Even proponents of a measure widely touted to help homeowners combat the nation's highest property taxes aren't taking passage for granted.

Voters have already approved constitutionally dedicating half of last year's one-penny sales-tax increase to property-tax reform.

This year, they are being asked to earmark the other half, bringing to $1.4 billion the amount of money locked in for relief efforts.

Advocates say the measure will guarantee a source of funding for the higher rebate checks homeowners received this year.

"This will make sure the relief is here this year and permanent into the future," said Assembly Speaker Joseph Roberts (D., Camden), the measure's chief backer.

But Lonegan, whose Vote No campaign also is targeting the measure, insists there are no guarantees the money will be used for rebates. It just has to be used for property-tax reform, which in the world of government, he noted, can mean just about anything.

Corzine, too, has questioned the wisdom of the measure, saying it ties up money the state and its rocky finances might need in an emergency.

Just one question on the ballot this year appears to have escaped any major controversy.

Public Question #4 asks voters to strike the terms "idiot" and "insane person" from a part of the Constitution dealing with the denial of voting rights. If the public approves, the words would be replaced with "person who has been adjudicated by a court of competent jurisdiction to lack the capacity to understand the act of voting."

Key legislators, including Codey, who pushed for the measure, say the change was long overdue.

Said Roberts: "People legitimately asked, 'How can we, as a progressive state, use words like idiot or moron in our body of laws?' "

Ballot Measures at a Glance

On Tuesday, New Jersey voters will decide four public questions - the most submitted to voters by the state since 1995.

Voters will be asked if they want to:

• Permanently dedicate all money from last year's percentage-point increase in the sales tax to property-tax relief.
• Approve borrowing $450 million for stem-cell research.
• Approve borrowing $200 million for farmland and open-space preservation.
• Revise language in the state constitution outlining when voting rights can be denied by replacing "idiot or insane person" with "person who has been adjudicated by a court of competent jurisdiction to lack the capacity to understand the act of voting."
  

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