The Jersey City Independent "

- Low Census Return Rates: U.S. Census Bureau officials are concerned about the lower-than-average number of New Jerseyans who are sending back their census forms. The problem is worst in urban areas like Jersey City, where less than a third of residents have sent in their forms.

- Flooding Around the City: Yesterday’s rain triggered flood warnings and took down trees, closed roads and stranded cars in pools of water. The Journal surveys the damage, and has some good photos as well.

- Infant Burned by Radiator: A 9-month-old baby suffered third-degree burns yesterday morning in the Heights when he apparently rolled over against a radiator and was taken to a burn unit at a Livingston hospital. Fire Department investigators responded, but doctors say the burns were consistent with the parents’ explanation and there appeared to be no wrongdoing.

- Rape Conviction Adds Prison Time: A 26-year-old Jersey City man faces up to 40 years in prison after his conviction in a 2006 Greenville rape during which he bled on the victim and DNA recovered by detectives led to his arrest.

- Property Taxes & SAT Performance: The real estate agents at the Shallis Group have put together an interesting graph that maps the property tax amounts and average SAT scores of all of Hudson County’s municipalities.

- Boating Safety Event Today: There will be a boating safety event this morning at Liberty State Park. State police say the session comes in the wake of a number of recent boating fatalities.

Today’s Best Bets:

- NJCU is the epicenter of Jersey City culture today, with two worthy events lined up. At 5 pm, illustrator Pat Cummings will be on hand for a free discussion of the prize-winning children’s book, Our Children Can Soar: A Celebration of Rosa, Barack and the Pioneers of Change, in which he and others are featured. The discussion is in conjunction with an exhibit featuring illustrations from the book. A few hours later, NJCU will wrap up it’s Women’s History Month programming with a closing ceremony featuring the Greek-American writer, performer and educator Angela Kariotis (7 pm).

In Statewide News:

- School District Consolidation: Two bills that would centralize school administration at the county level were introduced this week in the state Assembly. The sponsor of the legislation says the move could save money at a time when state budget cuts are forcing staff and program reductions at most schools. However, similar moves in the past have faltered.

- Court Upholds Privacy of Personal Email at Work: The state Supreme Court has ruled that a company should not have read emails a former employee wrote to her lawyer from a private, password-protected web account, even though she sent them from her employer’s computer. Attorneys say the ruling could influence workplace privacy rules across the country. The president of the Employers Association of New Jersey is praising the ruling, saying it “basically held the employer has an absolute right to monitor and retrieve emails, as long as it doesn’t violate the attorney-client relationship.”

- The Rain and NJ Farmers: Farmers in New Jersey are hoping for a quick dry out in the coming weeks, as they grapple with complications from a snowy winter and the wettest March on record in preparing for the summer planting season.

- SBA Lending Up: Halfway through the fiscal year, lending is up more than 50 percent and loan amounts are up nearly 70 percent at New Jersey’s division of the Small Business Administration. If the trend continues for the second half of the fiscal year — which ends Sept. 30 — it will be the first increase since fiscal year 2007.

- Pay Cut for Legislators? Two South Jersey Assembly members have re-introduced a bill that would cut the compensation for all New Jersey’s legislators by 10 percent.

- HIV/AIDS Up Among Seniors: State officials say that as of December 2008, there were 1,282 people age 65 and older living with HIV/AIDs — 32 percent of them are women. Seniors have the fastest rate of increase of HIV/AIDS cases in the past few years.

- Remaking the ‘Toll Collector’: State officials are weighing new job titles — as well as uniform updates and increased training — as they look to revamp the image of toll collectors as surly and rude.

- Turnpike Widening Keeps Rolling: Two more contracts, totaling almost $150 million, were awarded for two more segments of the massive New Jersey Turnpike widening Tuesday.

- Nets Avoid Dubious Honor: The New Jersey Nets’ Monday night win ensures the team will avoid breaking the mark for the worst NBA record ever, held by the 1972-73 76ers.

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