Friday Morning News Roundup
By Jon Whiten • Nov 13th, 2009 • Category: Blog
- On Wednesday we reported that T&M Associates denied giving any money to the campaign of At-Large councilman Mariano Vega*, a donation on his campaign finance reports that gave the engineering firm some trouble at this week’s council meeting. Today the Journal picks up the story, with a little more on Vega*’s reaction — and a report on at least one other company that might be in violation of the pay to play law.
- Sen. Sandra Cunningham is in danger of being tossed off the Hudson County Democratic Organization’s line in the 2011 Democratic primary, according to a Politicker report.
- More than 2,000 Jersey City PSE&G customers were without power for several hours yesterday after a tractor trailer collided with another truck at Route 1&9 and Duncan Avenue and then ran into a utility pole.
- Photographer Andres Serrano and filmmaker Adam Kahan, who made a documentary about him, were at the Jersey City Museum for a talk yesterday. The Journal has a report.
In statewide news:
- Thanks to loopholes in campaign finance laws at the state and county levels, the biggest government contractors in New Jersey routinely get lucrative, taxpayer-funded work while simultaneously making huge contributions to the candidates who vote to approve their contracts.
- New Jersey’s Democrats will have to adjust to fundraising in a post-Corzine world. “We had a very wealthy governor, and a lot of us got lazy,” state Sen. Steve Sweeney tells the Philadelphia Inquirer. “So now it’s going back to small donors. President Obama proved it could happen.”
- New Jersey continued to spew more carbon dioxide into the air each year between 2004 and 2007 even as neighboring states cut their emissions, a national study by Environment America finds. The report put the state 16th-worst among all 50 states in emissions.
- Gov. Corzine denies talking with Bank of America about taking a job as their CEO when he leaves office in January.
- The state Senate and Assembly are each scheduled to hold three lame-duck voting sessions between Dec. 7 and Jan. 11.
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Jon Whiten is the founding editor of the Jersey City Independent; he now works for a public-policy nonprofit in Trenton.
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