TODAY IN NEW JERSEY HISTORY

2007: The movement against Democratic Gov. Jon S. Corzine’s plan to make more money off New Jersey-owned properties such as toll roads - possibly by increasing highway tolls - is taking off. And the resistance isn’t limited to Republicans. “We are going to have an old fashioned rally to show the broad level of opposition to selling or leasing our toll roads, increasing our tolls or borrowing on our roads,” says Democratic Assemblyman Jeff Van Drew said. “You do not sell your home to pay off your credit card debt.” Republicans have relentlessly attacked Corzine’s intentions, but Democrats have begun distancing themselves from Corzine with polls showing voters worried about the governor’s plan. (Source: Courier News)

2006: Democratic Gov. Jon S. Corzine opens a special summer legislative session that was summoned to come up with ways to reform property taxes and provide property tax relief. “We’re going to achieve consensus because we have no alternative except to succeed,” says Assembly Speaker Joseph Roberts, D-Camden. “People don’t want a relief Band-Aid that will evaporate in a year or two. They want property-tax reform in a substantial way.” (Source: The Philadelphia Inquirer )

2005: A loophole in Megan’s Law that allowed sex offenders to move into New Jersey without immediately being added to the state’s offender registry is plugged, thanks to a group of people who complained after a pedophile from New York moved into their Atlantic County neighborhood. Instead of waiting up to 10 weeks for a risk assessment on a high-risk offender, county prosecutors can now petition a judge to put the person on the registry immediately. But law enforcement officials won’t be able to conduct door-to-door notifications of neighbors until after the state assigns a risk level. (Source: Courier-Post)

2004: Democratic U.S. Senator Jon S. Corzine strongly endorses Democratic Gov. James E. McGreevey for re-election, despite the criminal investigations swirling over his administration. “This is our governor and we’re standing with this gentleman,” Corzine declares at a breakfast meeting attended by a few hundred party leaders and activists, in Boston attending the Democratic National Convention. “I believe in Jim McGreevey. Let‘s stop the speculation and move on.” It is Corzine’s most pointed disavowal to date by Corzine of any interest in running for governor in 2005. With McGreevey at his side, Corzine lavishes praise on the governor’s policies and says, “I wish I could have a record like that to run on in the state of New Jersey.” (Source: The Philadelphia Inquirer)

2003: State officials have failed to improve evacuation routes from the Oyster Creek nuclear power plant during the past 22 years, despite receiving millions of dollars from the plant to pay for the work, state lawmakers representing Ocean County said today. State law mandates an annual assessment against plant operators to help defray the cost of building and maintaining roads that would be used as evacuation routes during a radiological release. While the assessment has also been earmarked to fund emergency and health-response plans, “no significant traffic improvements” have been made since lawmakers enacted the Radiation Accident Response Act in 1981, Sen. Leonard T. Connors, Assemblyman Christopher J. Connors and Assemblyman Brian E. Rumpf, all R-Ocean, said. (Source: The Press of Atlantic City )

2002: Democratic Gov. James E. McGreevey today announced that the state will create a new corporate structure aimed at eliminating bureaucratic delays in the massive and much maligned $8.6 billion school-construction program. The New Jersey Schools Corp. will be headed by Alfred T. McNeill, the former chief executive officer and chairman of Turner Corp., the largest building and construction organization in the country. The schools corporation will be a subsidiary of the New Jersey Economic Development Authority. (Source: Burlington County Times)