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♪ ♪ David: We know how much it will cost to cross into Manhattan and you won't like it.

There is a lot of transit and transportation news you won't like.

We will tell you about that later in the show.

We begin today with a look at the final days of the legislative session, what they call the lame-duck.

We are depending on the mood of the legislature.

A lot, or not a lot, can get done.

We will get two perspectives on what might or might not happen during the session.

We begin with the Senate Majority Whip sitting on judiciary and community affairs, Senator Troy Singleton.

Good to see you again.

Welcome.

We always hear the expression, we will fix it in lame-duck or get to it in lame-duck.

You have been at this more than a decade.

How often does the lame-duck session produced substantive law?

Troy: I don't know that it produces substantive law, but it does produce is a -- produce a lot of things freed a lot of times depending on the election results and whether or not we are transitioning to a new governor it can dictate the agenda.

Because we are in this situation moving forward there are a few ambitious things that will get accomplished during this time.

I think we will see bigger issues for a more thoughtful time when we get to lame-duck.

David: A couple weeks ago we were talking with the Senate President who dropped the idea you might support a reinstatement of the corporate business tax as a way to help fund New Jersey transit.

We heard the opposite from some of your other colleagues.

Let's hear it from the bullet -- budget chair on this and come back.

>> We need to find dedicated revenue in the budget.

I am not trying to be vague at all.

What that looks like, I'm not certain, frankly.

We should avoid any type of surcharge or tax on the business community.

David: He says he does not want to be vague, but he says he's not certain.

Where do you come down on the sunset of the corporate business tax?

Would you reinstate it?

Troy: I think we made it --.

They were telling to correct myself, the corporate business tax surcharge.

Troy: I think we made a conscious decision through the last budget cycle that we would not reauthorize the data.

It does mean we will have to make hard decisions through the course of the next fiscal year because revenues will not be as robust as projected.

I think that is the purview of the legislature to make those tough decisions.

I do not think that idea the governor articulated is an increase in the surcharge on top of our CBT is something we need to go back to.

I think we need to dig into our budget and be evaluative on the programs and pieces we have to make sure that taxpayers get the biggest bang for their buck.

I am open to that discussion and I think it is one we need to have.

David: If things get really bad, then you can go back to doing the surcharge if necessary, in theory, anyway.

Troy: You have to look at the facts as they present themselves.

We want to evaluate everything fairly.

David: You talk about some of the stuff that I guess it seems a little more doable.

What are two things on that list?

Troy: To lead right out of the box, we saw with the recent ransomware attack for national insurer fidelity we need to get serious about data privacy in our state.

I have been honored to work with the Senate select leader on a proposal to make sure we are not having folks information only monetized, but we also secure and protect that information.

That is the work we put in over the last two plus years to try to get us over the finish line.

I think we are there and we will try to move that to the governor's desk.

My colleagues on the health committee today are debating the casino smoking ban.

It is long past due for that conversation to be had for us to take some concrete action to protect workers as well as patrons.

I am looking forward to that debate.

It will be tough.

Because, a lot of people will talk about the economic impact of that decision.

But, I think we cannot play games anymore with people's lives.

We need to be serious about running to do both.

David: What about some of your priorities?

You are chair of community and urban affairs and serve on the joint committee on housing affordability.

That is probably one of the state's most pressing crises, affordable housing.

This seems like something that would obviously take more than the time you will have in a lame-duck session but the affordable housing crisis we had last week at the municipality gave us a big discussion about affordable housing during the legislative leaders panel.

Troy: As you know, we have passed money to the affordable housing trust.

I was happy to offer a budget resolution with my college to get that done, as well as the expansion and creation of our first-time homebuyer, first-generation homebuyer tax credit and a down payment assistance programs now being implement it.

I think we will try to double down on that by adding additional money to the program.

That is what we can do during the lame-duck time.

I will take a concerted effort in cooperation.

That is something we can do during lame-duck.

Or broadly around affordable housing, it's not something we should rush.

This is something I am looking forward to in the next legislative session.

As the round four numbers dictate to us coming up we will be able to actually finally address what are affordable housing process needs to look like.

And, we are taking a lot of commentary for -- from many individuals around that.

That is not something I will rush to get done during lame-duck.

I think it is appropriate for a new legislative session to take up immediately.

David: A lot of people thought you would run for this time to house seat, I guess, the third congressional district.

It I hear you say it is Washington that is more insane than the New Jersey legislature?

>> Yeah.

I am a big fan of Trenton, not as much Washington, D.C..

I will stick around with the people that will have me a little bit.

David: Our last question.

I have to ask what you think of Tammy Murphy's candidacy.

I know Andy Kim is your congressman.

>> Andy Kim is my Congressman and my friend.

First lady, I have enormous respect for her and I think she is an incredible person that would do well in elected office.

I just think Andy Kim, is at this juncture very equipped based on the practice and the work he has put in to be the next U.S.

Senator.

That said, whoever is our party nominee I will work like the Dickens to make sure they are the next U.S.

Senator.

That is the good thing about a primary done about substantive ideas our candidates have.

When it is all said and done we have an obligation to make sure our party now many moves forward and that is what I will do.

David: Senator Troy Singleton, thank you for coming on.

>> Thank you.

Have a great day.

David: Now a different perspective on the lame-duck session from the minority party, the Republican budget officer and also on the budget and appropriations and law and public safety committees.

It is a pleasure to welcome him back to Chat Box.

How are you?

I watched some of this panel from think NJBIA and some of your colleagues were on edge.

I heard the term fiscal cliff several times.

What set about?

-- what is that about?

>> It is what we will be left with once the pandemic money both federal and the echo of our rebounding economy works its way through our state coffers.

We will be right back where we started.

New Jersey has avoided doing anything to make our budget really more responsible in the past five years.

Longer than that, actually.

So, we will be right back to where we started.

Probably in a deeper hole then we started in before the pandemic.

We have really made no structural changes, and we will be left come again, looking into taxpayers from New Jersey and it Democrats probably telling them they are not paying enough area that's a big number.

It's probably several billion dollars once it is all sorted.

Right now it is kind of a muddled mess because of the influence of that artificial money from the federal government and the rebound in our economy.

David: So, Governor Murphy said, boy, we are lucky we socked away $8 billion in surplus.

Isn't he right?

>> To a certain extent.

First, we have that money sitting there now for years, most of that money.

As it has devalued itself, with inflation, it has been good to have healthy surplus.

But it is arguable we cap too much taxpayer money.

They are struggling.

They are paying higher gas prices, higher prices for everything.

Given the Bidenomic and federal Trump-ocrat -- federal Democrat outrageous spending levels.

The money borrowed from our children and grandchildren we did not need has driven down the value of every dollar.

We should have given some of that money back.

But you do want a healthy national surplus to cushion any sudden economic retrenchment.

That still does not solve that we are 6.5 years in and we are finally acknowledging a structural problem.

Where has he been the past 6.5 years?

Give me a break.

We could have solved a huge portion of the structural deficit had we done things like school funding reform.

We are shoveling out the door more than a billion dollars more than we actually need to and really can afford long-term.

Had we done this gradually over the past six years we could have gotten our school districts funded properly.

With that have been fair to them.

And possibly, been left with an extra billion dollars a year of real money.

David: We move on.

Lame-duck particularly lame for the minority, no?

You don't get much of a hearing of anything during this time, do you?

>> Well, we will see.

My friends on the others of the aisle criticize each other.

It Democrats, Republicans in New Jersey.

But we are nowhere near at the level of dysfunction that is Washington, D.C.. We really get along and work together on a pretty regular basis.

So, I am hopeful we can get some Republican priorities like energy tax receipts and money for energy tax receipts and a commitment within state government that we will meet our obligations there.

Indexing income taxes.

Republicans want to save people money.

Those are our initiatives, or some of them, for lame-duck.

David: We heard Paul Sarno earlier in the program talk about the corporate business tax surcharge to fund NJ transit.

The Senate President a couple weeks ago told us he would be amenable to that.

Then, the governor and the budget chair close the door on that.

How will you fund New Jersey transit and is it a priority for you guys, or should it be a priority for you guys during the lame-duck session?

>> It should be a priority.

But this is something we have known about.

He covered his entire term before that.

We should have been able to chew gum and walk at the same time.

And handle the pandemic and also handle doing our jobs.

We did not.

The pandemic was cover for my friends on the ever -- other side of the aisle to do nothing about these issues.

And New Jersey transit should have been part of a comprehensive set of reforms we enact that will make sure we are funding all these things, but not crushing taxpayers at the same time.

Right now I do not know the answer is because we have kicked the can down the road for 6.5 years.

David: We keep hearing a lot about reform to the elections transparency act.

Do you think either of those will see action during lame-duck?

>> It is what benefits the majority party.

My good friends I do not think we will see much reform to the elections transparency act.

So-called.

It should be the election opacity act.

It was garbage reform and we did it.

OPRA reform I think we will see an attempt at that.

My friends on the other side of the aisle of eye of some is good more must be better.

So, likely they will do OPRA reform and it will go too far, far beyond reform really needed to help municipalities deal with sometimes massive OPRA requests.

It will also restrict you and the media and the public from accessing information with transparency.

David: Last, you have to come up with a Senate candidate in 24.

Where is the mayor of Mendham it?

>> You never know.

Other people may jump in.

The mayor of Mendham has been working, doing a really good job on the campaign trail.

If other people could jump in.

Our party has a good bench.

So, we just have to wait and see.

It will be an interesting cycle all the way around.

I can break the news right now and say, this senator will not be running for U.S. Senate.

I know that is the kernel you are going for.

David: Everybody has clicked off their TV's.

Thanks.

Trying to keep that I am out of the lame-duck session, Declan is gallant, good to see you Senator.

I was not kidding when I said you probably would not like much of what you hear in this next segment.

The pressure is on transportation budgets.

They will affect you and not in a good way.

Let's get our experts in to talk about this.

Colleen Wells covers transportation issues for the Bergen record North Jersey.com and Larry Higgs is the transportation and community reporter at NJ.com and the Star-Ledger.

Good news first.

Groundbreaking for the gateway this week.

You were both at that.

What does it mean, Larry?

A: Actually I was not -- Larry: I was not at that.

I was playing hooky in congestion.

It was a shovel in the ground finally for a lot of skeptics that thought this would never happen.

It is basically a book ended groundbreaking in New York for the third part of the tunnel vault under Hudson yards.

The groundbreaking basically resumes construction on a bridge that would take routes over the new tunnel mouth, the infamous project that was stopped by Chris Christie in 2010.

The gateway people said, the partially completed bridge was buried under sand and dirt.

So, almost to hide it in shame.

This kind of restarts the process.

David: Colleen, you could have been covering the ribbon-cutting this week too.

This is good news, anyway, right?

Colleen: Like berry touched on -- Larry touched on, it is symbolic that there are -- is construction on both sides of the river.

Both states are physically invested.

They will be financially invested in the project.

That has been critical to get to this point.

It will be more critical to get it over the finish line.

Now, they still have a ways to go.

They have months to go before full funding grant agreement.

The biggest chunk of federal dollars, $6.88 million is solidified.

So, there is no need to, as Murphy likes to put it, spike any footballs yet.

But, they are well on their way.

David: Yeah.

It is possible that at some point we will be at a presser where someone from the New York side and someone from the jersey shied -- side meet with the final sledge hammer and shake hands, right?

Will that happen.

Colleen: Never.

David: All right.

Let's deal with some of the unpleasantness of the week.

The toll for congestion pricing has been revealed to be $15.

Ouch.

What has the reaction been?

Colleen: The comments and reaction flooding in last night after several media organizations got that report leaked.

So on the Jersey side naturally everybody is up in arms with Governor Murphy leading the charge with Congressman John Gottheimer, involved in lawsuits to try to pause that project and program.

This was not new or shocking to anyone.

We will see if the lawsuits have any effect on the implementation of the program they hope will be launched in the spring.

David: The $15 number was bandied about before.

What was it the reaction been that you have gotten?

Talk about how $15 is not $15 for everybody.

Larry: They did some explanation at the MTA presser with folks from the traffic mobility review board.

They said their raison d'être was to keep the base fee as low as possible.

The $15 fee comes under the middle of the two extremes from seven scenarios.

It was a low of nine dollars as a base fee with no exemption or credit for anybody.

A high of 23 dollars would have had exemptions for every bridge in town you can think of.

They came back with a few exemptions.

You can use at the Holiday Inn Lincoln Tunnel and get five dollars off the $50 toll.

-- $15 toll.

If you don't pay with EZ pass you're told is 50% higher.

Your congestion fee will be $22.50.

The reason they did that was basically to cover the cost.

Because, they mail you a bill.

They have to go through all the administrative stuff.

The other part is, 92 percent of MDA customers have E-ZPass.

They figure that that would affect a small amount of people.

The good news is, you don't have to have a specific MTA E-ZPass to get the E-ZPass range.

They will take any E-ZPass, from New Jersey, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Juan, you name it.

-- Guam you name it.

David: Did you say while -- Guam?

What is the timeline now?

What is the process?

Where do we go from here?

Colleen: The next step will be for the traffic mobility review board to actually pass.

They have to vote on a measure that gets kicked to the MTA or a larger board that then has to approve it.

It is not set in stone by any means.

There are still tweaks and changes.

I believe someone from the board has already resigned over this matter, as of the whole issue has unfurled in the last when he four hours.

-- as the whole issue has unfurled over the last 24 hours.

David: The MTRB yet another acronym to memorize.

A couple weeks ago we heard the Senate President suggest he could support reinstating the corporate business tax surcharge.

Advocates say that could prove to be a stable funding source for NJ transit.

A couple of resounding nose in the wake of the Senate President comments.

From the Governor end of the budget committee chair.

Where are we at on that Larry?

Larry: Well, it is not like the parrot on Monty Python but it is close to it.

The governor says it won't happen.

Both budget committee chair people say it won't happen.

The majority of leaders say it won't happen.

It is probably done.

That leads to the question of what is next.

At that time range from anything from trying to cobble together other revenue sources, perhaps, dedicating other revenue sources to NJ transit.

Or, perhaps, letting them and take a fair increase and service cuts over the next fiscal year.

And estate with this smaller amount of the fiscal crisis as of the federal money for COVID runs out.

That would be a $119 million gap.

There has not been a fare increase since 2015 and now there will have been four pole increases since -- toll increases since 2020.

There might be a feeling that now is the time for transit riders to step up.

David: You have both reported about fair increases, told hikes, service cuts.

All potentially on the way.

Who will be doing what they are, Colleen?

Colleen: Great question.

I am glad that Larry brought up 2015.

At that time, they faced at the same dollar figure of a fiscal crisis about $120 million.

They made internal cuts.

They cut bus trips and maybe some rail at that time and still had $856 million deficit.

Then there was a 9% fare increase that year.

That is the way book transit has.

Actually, not to transit as much as the governor has now.

When they say every option on the table that is what I think he is talking about.

I asked him today, what are you considering?

There were no specifics.

He seemed to suggest the real problem is not now, but two years from now when there is almost a one million-dollar deficit.

But frankly, this is pretty serious.

Just as we are seeing, especially, seeing more bus ridership, those ridership numbers are almost back or exceeding pre-pandemic levels.

To think about punting that service now, that could be catastrophic.

David: Larry, can you counter Debbie downer over here?

Is there any good news?

Larry: We are waiting for NJ transit to come up with the alignment report promised in April.

That will tell the story about what they want to do to collect, that transportation commissioner said she wants to basically make sure they can take as much efficiency before they ask for more money.

That will be the start of it.

The thing is, we have a really short window here.

It is almost December.

The governor's budget message will be in a couple months.

That will really set the tone as far as what will be done.

The legislature reviews it.

But, in 2015 the legislature had the option of plowing $60 million from somewhere else in the budget to avoid the fair increase and the Democrats voted not to do that because you will be taking the money away from someone else's program and nobody wants to be the bad guy.

So, I am Larry downer, I guess you could say.

David: All right, thank you both of you.

Colleen Wilson, Larry Hanks, good to see you both.

That is Chat Box for this week.

Thank you to Senators Singleton and Scanlon for joining us.

Follow me on Twitter at DavidC ruzNJ and find full episodes when you scan the QR code are your screen.

From all the crew at date -- Gateway Center, we will see you next week.

Announcer: Major funding for "Chat Box with David Cruz" is provided by the members of the New Jersey education Association, making public schools great for every child.

Promotional support is provided by Insider NJ, a political intelligence network dedicated to New Jersey's political news.

Insider NJ is committed to giving serious political players an interactive forum for ideas, discussion, and insight.

Online at insiderNJ.com.

♪ ♪