Kyrillos Supports Lawsuit Forcing Corzine To Release Budget Impoundment Documents

Senator Calls for Special Session to Bring Budget into Balance

Senator Joseph Kyrillos (R-13) gave his support today to a lawsuit filed December 31by members of the Senate Republican Caucus against the Corzine administration and is calling for a special session of the Legislature to put New Jersey's budget back into balance.

The State's $600 million surplus has been wiped out by a more than $1.2 billion drop in revenue and the Governor's signature of almost $ 200 million of spending bills without offsetting budget cuts.

The lawsuit is necessary because Governor Corzine has refused for more than a month to release documents that show how he has used his power to freeze budget funds in response to the growing budget imbalance. Despite a release from the Governor on Wednesday promising to turn over documents showing how he used the power "within hours," he has still refused to explain his use of the power.

"It's sad that a lawsuit is necessary in order to find out whether the governor has been using his power to put funds in reserve aggressively enough and to find out which funds have been impacted," Kyrillos stated.

"After the Governor explains the extent of the budget problem and his efforts to deal with it, the Legislature needs to step up to the plate," said Kyrillos. "The Legislature needs to act on common sense budget solutions, whether its kicking commission members who meet once per month out of the pension system, bringing sanity to an education formula that continues to shovel more than 20% increases in aid to places like Hoboken, or reforming and scaling back a mismanaged grant program that gives up to $45 million increases in aid to favored cities while everyone else's aid is cut."

In June, Republican members of the Legislature unveiled their “Common-Sense Plan for an Affordable New Jersey,” which detailed $1.32 billion in unnecessary spending in Governor Corzine’s FY 2009 budget proposal. The examples of savings above are just some of the savings proposed that the Governor has refused to accept. The detailed plan, which can be found at http://www.senatenj.com/plan/, was summarily rejected by Governor Corzine and members of the Democratic Party who hold majorities in both houses of the state legislature.