The news for New Jersey’s state budget has been ugly recently. Mike Symons, of the Gannett State Bureau, wrote a recent column explaining that there’s a chance it could get even worse.
While New Jersey has had projected budget deficits for more than four years running, those were all based on predictions of revenue versus spending before a budget was struck. That gave governors a chance to trim back expectations in order to balance their spending plans before it was approved.
But the latest crisis, writes Symons, my former editor and mentor on all things budget, is different from those in recent years in that it comes once the budget year has begun – meaning state money is already spent or in the process of being spent. And towns and schools are counting on portions of the budget, making it harder to cut back.
That leaves less room for Gov. Corzine to maneuver.
Corzine has placed the deficit for the budget ending June 30 at $1.2 billion. He warned that it could be lower or higher.
Symons points out that the last time this happened was in 2001 and 2002. And his column notes that it would take a significant turnaround from recent revenue trends to keep to the $1.2 billion figure.
Here's the column: http://www.app.com/article/20081120/NEWS0301/811200307/1007/NEWS03
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