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.

PNC Bank issue remains alive

There’s a petition making the rounds in Cranbury (see Friday’s Press for details) seeking to get the Township Committee to put the question of whether the PNC Bank building should be purchased by the township back on the table.

The bank, which is for sale with a pricetag of around $1.4 million, has become a somewhat contentious issue, with supporters viewing it as a way to provide parking and expand library services and opponents seeing it as an unnecessary cost. It appears that opinion is split pretty equally, though that is not something that is easily determined.

A majority on the committee (Stave, Stannard and Stout) appears to favor a study, though a fourth would be needed to actually move ahead with the sale. And right now both Tom Panconi and Wayne Wittman oppose it.

Wittman, of course, has opted not to seek re-election this year and the bank sale could have an impact on the race for his seat — the same way that the Updike property decision helped Democrats several years ago.

We’ve come out editorially in favor of the purchase, though I can see the merit of both arguments. I still believe the purchase can work for the township, but not if it divides the community.

As a compromise, it would make sense to do a study that looks examines not just the initial cost but the cost of renovations and how borrowing to cover the purchase and renovations would affect the township’s credit and debt load.

Once that’s done, the committee should consider putting the PNC sale on the ballot in a non-binding referendum designed to gauge community interest.

What the committee needs to do is diffuse the bank as a divisive issue so that it doesn’t poison debate in town on other issues.

Email me at grassroots at comcast dot net.

McCain’s clueless economics

John McCain, the Republican nominee for president, proves how little he knows about the economy every time he opens his mouth on the economy. Consider the add embedded in this post in light of this story from The New York Times:

About 62,000 jobs disappeared in June, the government reported Friday, the sixth consecutive month that payrolls have declined, as businesses rushed to lay off workers amid the worst economic climate in a generation.

And as job losses mount, even those still on payrolls have felt the pain: employers are putting hours for their full-time employees and shrinking salaries, just as workers face record-high prices for gasoline and food.

The unemployment rate stayed steady in June at 5.5 percent, the highest level in four years. The elevated figure dispelled speculation among some economists that last month’s half-percentage point jump, the biggest monthly spike in 22 years, was a statistical anomaly.

Indeed, employers have been steadily shedding jobs for the last three months. Businesses cut 52,000 more workers in May and April than the government first thought, the Labor Department said, casting aside initial estimates that suggested some deceleration.

In the last 12 months, the economy had seen a net gain of only 15,000 jobs, the lowest net increase since November 2003.

In the last 50 years, the economy has entered a recession every time jobs have dropped for six consecutive months.

And most Americans who are still employed earned less money in June than they did a year ago. Wages, which have been steadily shrinking in recent months, took a sharp hit last month, growing at the slowest pace since September 2005.

Among rank-and-file workers, who make up the majority of the nation’s work force, weekly paychecks have grown 2.8 percent in the last 12 months. That was down from 3.2 percent in May and well below the rate of inflation.

Average hourly earnings grew 3.4 percent, the slowest pace since the start of 2006.

McCain’s response to the report — boilerplate Republican nonsense — is equally as illuminating:

“At a time when our small businesses need support from Washington, we cannot raise taxes, increase regulation and isolate ourselves from foreign markets,” Senator John McCain, the Republican candidate, said in a statement. He called for tax relief, job creation, and investment in innovation.

So, workers are hurting so we’ll … help … business…..? And while he speaks of small business, we all know that the businesses most likely to benefit will not be so small.

Email me at grassroots at comcast dot net.

The court and clean elections

Voluntary public financing — a necessity if we are to remove the taint of private money from electoral politics — appears safe in the wake of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling, though I think reform advocates have a right to be concerned.

A close reading of this story in the Asbury Park Press indicates that there are few campaign finance experts in New Jersey who view the court’s ruling as being at odds with the state’s program. The primary “expert” tying the court decision back to the state’s clean-election program is Mike Schrimpf, a flack with the conservative Center for Competitive Politics (is there a greater example of false advertising?), an organization that opposes public financing.

“Rescue funds are primarily designed to level the playing field, and the court explicitly said that the Legislature cannot use the “leveling the playing field’ rationale as a reason to justify campaign-finance laws,” said Michael Schrimpf, a spokesman for the Center for Competitive Politics, which opposes using public funds for elections.

The experts — who come from both parties — take a different view:

Nick Nyhart, president of the Public Campaign Action Fund, said publicly funded elections have withstood court challenges in the past as courts have ruled government can place limits to curb actual or perceived corruption. What may differentiate New Jersey’s program is that the more onerous burden is placed on the candidate who volunteers for the program, not the self-funded one.

In the federal law — known as the millionaire’s amendment, which was inspired by now-Gov. Jon Corzine’s successful run for U.S. Senate in 2000 — the free spender has more reporting requirements while the opponent gets relaxed contribution limits.

“As a candidate, you don’t give anything up in order to get the relaxation of campaign contributions. It’s a pure gift,” Nyhart said. “For candidates who agree to public financing, they do agree to a spending limit and the amount of (rescue) funds are also limited, so certainly a candidate can outspend you.”

Two of New Jersey’s prominent partisan election lawyers agreed.

“If you sign into Clean Elections, you may be entitled to that money as part of a voluntary program — a little different than what’s going on at the federal level,” Republican lawyer Mark Sheridan said.

Another key difference, said Democratic lawyer Angelo Genova, is that New Jersey’s rescue money is awarded on a case-by-case basis with a ruling by the state Election Law Enforcement Commission, not a blanket formula, as the congressional law was written.

The decision does question “whether or not the ability of the publicly financed candidate to seek additional public financing imposes a burden on the self-financed candidate who doesn’t participate in the Clean Elections program,” Genova said. “I think reading this opinion, our program can withstand that scrutiny because it’s dealt with on a case-by- case, and not a formula, basis.”

Email me at grassroots at comcast dot net.