Author: hankkalet

Hank Kalet is a poet and freelance journalist. He is the economic needs reporter for NJ Spotlight, teaches journalism at Rutgers University and writing at Middlesex County College and Brookdale Community College. He writes a semi-monthly column for the Progressive Populist. He is a lifelong fan of the New York Mets and New York Knicks, drinks too much coffee and attends as many Bruce Springsteen concerts as his meager finances will allow. He lives in South Brunswick with his wife Annie.

Runner’s diary Thursday

Run number two for the week took place on a treadmill at the gym because of the threat of rain. I managed four miles in 36:44 (actually 4.2 in about 37:30). I finished with some oblique crunches on a 45-degree angle bench.

Music: Frightened Rabbit's outstanding 2008 release, The Midnight Organ Fight.

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Email me at grassroots at comcast dot net.

For gay couples, a fair accounting

Information is power, as they say. For gay and lesbian couples, the official U.S. Census now underway may just offer the kind of information needed to generate enough political power to end the charade that keeps them from getting married under civil law.

The Census, “for the first time,” will give same-sex couples “the opportunity to call their union a marriage in an official government document.”

In a policy shift experts say could radically reshape demographic profiles of the gay community, the U.S. Census this year will let same-sex couples label themselves as husband or wife even if their relationships are not recognized by law.

The move could have wide-ranging policy implications, as Gary Gates, a demographer with the University of California, Los Angeles,  said in today’s Star-Ledger. It could “offer a rich source of data about how same-sex couples describe themselves, as well as their family structure.”

And that should change the debate from one based on misinformation and innuendo to one based on fact.

Email me at grassroots at comcast dot net.

‘I’ll gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today’

I am not the only New Jersey columnist who believes the state needs to rethink how its local governments are organized. Alfred Doblin, editorial page editor for The Record, takes on the sacred cow of home rule in his column today:

What is more important: Quality education or a local school district? Is the firefighter less competent because he or she answers to a regional supervisor instead of a local chief? Does it matter if the municipality, county or an independent contractor removes snow as long as the snow is removed?

He likens the state’s fiscal crisis to the Chicago fire that destroyed that city in the late 19th Century, saying New Jersey has “burned down” and adding that “We should not build it like it was.” As he says of the sacred cow of “Home rule” — a “very big cow”: “it’s time it either produced a beverage or became an entrée.”

The fiscal reality is bleak. But there are ways of providing many of the services we expect while still spending less. We don’t have too many teachers. We don’t have too many parks. We don’t have too many roads. We have too many districts. We have too many municipalities. We have too many departments that essentially duplicate other departments.

It is in the new governor’s hands. Gov. Chris Christie, Doblin says, “has the personality to withstand the blowback from reactionaries afraid of change.” But does he have the vision? Is he willing to take on the web of problems that have created our fiscal mess, or does he plan to just slash indiscriminately, balancing the books but breaking our backs?

The jury is still out, though his budget freeze — which essentially will create problems for many school districts next year and exacerbates pension problems — raises some concerns.

Ultimately, though, as Doblin points out,

Change is happening. The issue is whether it is change for the better or for the worse. It is time to put the home-rule sacred cow on the altar of fiscal sanity.

In desperate times, every cow is accountable. Either produce milk or end up as hamburger.

That may not be popular, but it has to happen.

Email me at grassroots at comcast dot net.