>> Funding for NJ Spotlight News provided by the members of the New Jersey Education Association, making public schools great for every child.

And RWJBarnabas health, let's be healthy together.

Briana: Tonight on "NJ Spotlight News."

The nation's top cop pays a visit to New Jersey, warning against the rise in hate fueled violence and threats of terrorism since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war.

>> No person and no community of this country should have to live in fear of hateful bias.

Fulfilling that bias motivates us every single day.

Briana: Also, after being embroiled in curriculum controversies, the woman at the helm of the state schools is stepping down.

>> We have a lot of education challenges so hopefully the administration will pick someone great who can work in a collaborative way through legislature.

Briana: Placid, dangerous delay spirit supply chain issues at two major wait times for wheelchair parts, leaving some immobile for months.

>> This is not just a wheelchair I use sometimes.

This is really my body.

Briana: And extending a lifeline.

Isaiah house helping formerly incarcerated women reenter society.

>> With this funding, we are of having women who are reentering society, we can help them get stability but also an opportunity to have their children living with them in the process.

Briana: "NJ Spotlight News," begins right now.

♪ >> From NJ PBS Studios, this is "NJ Spotlight News," with Rihanna Vannozzi.

Briana: Good evening at thank you for joining us.

The nation's top law enforcement officer says the Justice Department is staying vigilant in the face of potential hate fueled violence and threats.

Attorney General Merrick Garland today visited New Jersey's U.S. attorney, laying out priorities to compact the impact -- combat the impact of hate here at home, impacting Jewish, Arab, and Muslim communities at home and have state and local law enforcement are partnering to help the safety of everyone in New Jersey.

Ted Goldberg reports.

>> No person and no community in this country should have to live in fear of hateful violence.

Fulfilling that promise motivates us every single day.

>>>> That was the message from U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland today, speaking to reporters before meeting with New Jersey law enforcement readers in Newark.

Agent Garland touched on a few topics including the ongoing hostage exchanges between Israel and Hamas.

>> Over the last few days, over 40 hostages who were kidnapped by Hamas were released.

Among them is a four-year-old American.

We welcome her return and hope to see the return of more hostages in the days to come.

Reporter: Garland says the Department of Justice has seen a spike in hate and threat speech since Hamas invaded Israel in October.

>> All of us have seen a sharp increase in the volume and frequency of threats against Jewish, Muslim, and Arab communities in the country since October 7.

There's understandable fear in communities across the country.

The Justice Department's remaining vigilant in the face of potential threats of hate fueled threats and violence.

We are closely monitoring the impact violence in the Middle East will have on homegrown violent and domestic violent extremists, here in the United States and abroad.

Reporter: Garland spoke alongside the U.S. attorney for the state of New Jersey.

They touted anti-violence programs coordinated between national and local law enforcement.

>> These are focused on building intelligence and resource sharing between federal, state and local law enforcement to go after the most significant drivers of violent crime including gun violence.

Just one example of what that looks like in practice, March of this year the office brought charges against 10 members and associates of a Jersey City gang for drug trafficking.

That was part of the Jersey City violent crime initiative.

>> Statewide in most of the major cities, violent crime went down materially from 2022 to 2021 and again this year.

Reporter:Reporter: The Attorney General also spoke about Fentanyl and highlighted federal efforts to stop its spread around New Jersey.

>> Two months ago, this office charged an individual accused of selling Fentanyl that cause the death of people in New Jersey.

Investigations in the lead to resources in the Justice Department, Homeland security investigations, the North Brunswick Police Department.

Garland called Fentanyl the Reporter: Deadliest Reporter: drug threat America ever faced, just one of several issues concerning the department of justice enforcement statewide.

I'm Ted Goldberg, "NJ Spotlight News."

Briana: Meanwhile, Israel and Hamas agreed to extend a temporary pause in fighting for two more days in a deal brokered by cutter and Egypt -- Qatar and Egypt announced today.

More women and children have been released from Gaza in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.

A four-year-old American girl was one of the hostages released.

Video showed emotional reunions between hostages and loved ones who waited anxiously to find out their condition.

Israel released more than 100 Palestinian women and children who were being held in prisons.

Under the terms of the initial agreement, the Israeli military will extend the paused by a day for every 10 additional hostages released by Hamas beyond the initial 50.

The pause in the war also means more aid is getting into Gaza, where food, water and medicine have been scarce, renewing hope for a permanent cease-fire as the conflict enters a near second full month.

After a bumpy three years at the helm of the State education department, acting Commissioner Angelica Allen McMillan is leaving her post.

In a statement today from the governor's office, the administration said she is retiring at the end of January, thanking her for her service during what the governor called an incredibly challenging time for our schools.

Alluding of course to controversies over the sex education curriculum and gender identification policies.

Though she served as Commissioner, she was never actually confirmed by the Senate to hold the position.

An unwritten rule known as senatorial courtesy blocked that.

Educators and schools have been hit with an onslaught of issues in recent years.

Our Senior correspondent Brenda Flanagan was at the Statehouse today and spoke with the Senate education committee chair about the most pressing items for the legislature.

>> We want to make sure mental health is defined and it's not creating additional challenges with the teacher shortage.

I think there are a few pieces to work out.

With everyone having been focused on elections, I don't think due diligence has happened.

We will be meeting with the school boards Association, the teachers union, and everybody to make sure that we work out all the fried -- fine print about depression and anxiety.

As someone who struggled with depression my whole life, it's extremely important to make sure that's not a barrier to people succeeded -- succeeded.

>> I know there's something about someone feeling possibly with suicidal ideation and staying home.

>> All of these are legitimate concerns especially if parents or guardians are working and no one is at home.

I think it needs to be fleshed out.

We continue to face a challenge where we have 600 school districts with very different mental health programs.

You can go district by district, it read bank they have an incredible program.

-- in Red Bank, they have an incredible program.

Other districts don't have those resources so that needs to be fleshed out.

>> Would New Jersey set a limit on the number of mental health behavioral aid?

>> It's tough to limit because it's an illness.

No one feels better after two days or three days.

Everyone's struggle is different so there needs to be more fleshed out and we need to be realistic about who's at home and what are the next steps?

How can we help make the child feel better and are there resources available?

>> And they have to go to the DOE to set standards in conjunction with the Department of Health?

>> I have to look at Senator Cody's.

They do, so we want to make sure there are guidelines.

We know right now with the Commissioner of education, there is none right now.

There are a couple other things to navigate.

>> Could you talk about the fact that we are not going to have a Commissioner of education, apparently she is resigning as of January?

>> She's retiring, yes.

I spoke to her over the weekend and wish her well.

We've had a lot of education challenges as well.

Hopefully the administration will pick someone great who can work collaboratively with the legislature.

>> Is this a surprise?

>> She's been longer serving, three years, pretty long for a Commissioner.

Toward the end of her career so not entirely surprising.

>> Do you have anyone that comes to mind that you would want to put forward?

>> I don't, but I'm looking forward to working with the administration.

This is the end of the school funding formula.

We have a lot of challenges as it relates to making sure we employ more teachers.

We did a lot of bills today as it relates to the teacher shortage but we want to make sure we have a DOE and Commissioner that will side with us.

Angelica was always friendly and courteous, with things we agreed on and worked together and there are things we disagreed on, but she was always very respectful and I appreciated that.

Briana: A new report finds despite New Jersey's stance on reproductive rights, it is not that easy to get an abortion in the state.

The Rutgers School of Public Health and New Jersey family planning week put together the first-ever statewide analysis of abortion access and identify that half, 11 of the 21 counties, have limited or no abortion services.

But the state ranked sixth in the nation for the number of abortions performed here and has seen an increase in the amount of out-of-state patients seeking care for the 2022 Dobbs decision.

Antiabortion advocates say text pair money should not be used to increase services, but the report argues that the geographical gaps are problematic.

I'm joined by Laura Lindberg, a professor at the Rutgers School of Public Health.

Thank you so much for joining me.

This report was fairly interesting because this juxtaposition of New Jersey taking aggressive stances on reproductive rights and yet, what did you find when it came to access?

>> New Jersey has been a leader in protecting abortion rights, but the report finds continued gaps in access and rights without access do not give people the ability to control their reproductive lives.

So some of the key things we found in this report was a concerning gap in the availability of abortion services in the southern part of New Jersey.

We found five counties where there were no abortion clinics in New Jersey and that included the four southernmost counties, which puts great burdens of travel on people in those counties particularly given the week trance protection -- transportation infrastructure in those counties.

Briana: It was also interesting be the geographical gap, even in areas where there were brick-and-mortar providers, there seemed to be limited services.

Can you talk about what you found?

>> We found a couple different things.

First we identified 41 brick-and-mortar abortion providers in the state and additional seven virtual only providers, but we found six counties in which the only kind of abortion care that was available is medication abortion.

While this is a good choice for some people, it's only available up through 11 weeks of gestation and it's not everyone's first choice.

Having to travel across counties to access procedural abortion poses challenges in time, transportation, and cost.

We also found gestational differences between counties.

Those counties with just medication abortion only had care through 11 weeks and we did not find a single brick-and-mortar provider that offers abortion care into the third trimester.

We know patients in New Jersey are forced to travel out of state to receive this important care.

Briana: What are the implications according to your report?

Of course the landscape is being looked at through the lens of a post Roe v. Wade era and the governor himself has said he wants New Jersey to be a safe haven for abortions.

>> New Jersey has taken many active steps to increase access to abortion care in the state and certainly to protect rights, but some of the things that have gone on to increase access including expanding the type of professionals who can provide care, such as the right to provide procedural care to midwives with appropriate training and there are efforts underway to increase the Medicaid reimbursement rate in the state.

But our study found was the Medicare -- Medicaid reapportionment -- the Medicaid reimbursement is not on par with other states.

Briana: Laura Lindberg is a professor of urban global public health.

Thank you for sharing the findings with us.

In our spotlight on business report, after months of waiting, Governor Murphy finally took action on a bill that would have eased restrictions on the states breweries and distilleries.

Conditionally vetoing the legislation in an attempt to get broader liquor license reforms passed in the lame-duck session.

The original bill passed this summer would have allowed breweries to serve food and would remove a cap limiting them to hold 25 events per year which owners say stifled business.

The governor is asking lawmakers to add measures that would also "inject inactive pocket licenses into the market," and provide more opportunities for shopping mall bound businesses to partake in alcohol sales.

The conditional veto today is seen as a compromise between the Murphy administration and a group representing current liquor license holders who uproot -- oppose the push to eliminate caps, one license per 3000 residents in every town.

Saying new licenses will flood the market and decrease the value of current ones which cost some business owners more than $1 million.

On Wall Street, stocks dipped slightly today but are still on track for the best month in over a year.

Here's how the markets closed.

♪ >> Support for the business report provided by the New Jersey tourism industry Association.

NJ TIA will host their New Jersey conference on tourism November 30 through December 1 at resorts Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City.

NJTIA.org for event information.

And Rowan University, partnering with New Jersey businesses, transforming New Jersey's future.

♪ Briana: For three decades, Isaiah house in East Orange has been a lifeline for some of the families most in need in our state, and now they are expanding pair the nonprofit recently received hundreds of thousands of dollars to help formerly incarcerated women get back on their feet after leaving prison.

We explore how Isaiah house will use its long list of social programs to help women reentering society.

>> We basically provide what we call shelter from the storm.

We have multiple programs inside our shelter as well as outside where we assist people with kind of being an layover until they are able to get the footing.

Reporter: Isaiah Houston each -- East Orange has been for 35 years providing food, shelter and clothing along with mental health care, job training, daycare and much more.

This past year they received at 300 $50,000 grant from the Department of Corrections to help women coming out of prison get back on their feet.

>> With this funding, we are allowed to have women who are just reentering society, we can help them get stability but also allow them an opportunity to have their children living with them in the process of gaining that stability.

We know having been away from their children for so long is challenging.

Reporter: Women like Maria Pacheco Lopez who was incarcerated for three years, separated from her eight-year-old daughter and five-year-old son.

>> Before I lived at the halfway house, I did not have a house.

Isaiah house, they helped me with housing and I can live with my daughter.

>> A lot of the women, when they come out, they have strained relationships, they have relationships they need to repair, so a lot of them don't have places to automatically return to.

So that is the number one need for them.

The second need I can tell you is the mental health capacity a lot of women.

.

Come out of the jails with anxiety, PTSD and depression.

Reporter: Isaiah health practices with mental health providers along with classes for those trying to reunite with their kids or regain custody.

In some cases, legal services are provided, like in Maria's case who is working to regain custody of her son who lives with his father.

And they help the women find jobs, which is a critical component to preventing recidivism.

>> They might return to the things that got them sent back into places, into the jails.

A lot of them turn back to drugs, alcohol.

Unfortunately, a lot of them, just to get their needs and basic things, they turn to sex work.

That's the things that we try to dissuade.

>> We are able to establish a memorandum of understanding with the community Food Bank, who is a long-standing partner, to have slots specifically held for our clients for the culinary arts program and the warehouse program, where they can get a say Sigma certification and a culinary arts degree.

And they pair them with employment so it's a win-win.

Reporter: Maria was able to get certified in phlebotomy during her time here.

The staff provided her transportation to classes and to her paid job each day.

She since applied for a job as a phlebotomist and is one of the few rules that residents have to abide by, she is her money to move out.

>> My plan is to continue living with my family, my mom, my son and daughter, and continue working.

I'm looking for housing.

Reporter: Isaiah house is expanding early next year.

They will move the women in this program into these homes which is actually the side of the original building.

They will be able to house up to 25 women and their children, giving them a second lease on life.

In East Orange, Joanna Gagis, "NJ Spotlight News."

Briana: Over the last few years, a crisis for wheelchair users has reached a tipping point.

Major delays, often several months long, in getting chairs repaired.

It can take even longer for those on wait lists to get a brand-new one.

As Raven Santana reports, that's a result of recent supply chain issues paired with a maze of bureaucratic red tape and insurance companies.

>> I just received an updated email right now saying that the part is still not available.

And we are in November.

Reporter:Reporter: It has been four months since Montclair resident Colleen Roche has had a fully working wheelchair.

She was born with cerebral palsy and is an active wheelchair user, depends on it as a secondary skeleton.

>> I've already traveled over 650 miles and it.

So this isn't just a wheelchair I only use sometimes.

This is really my body.

Reporter: Despite her chair being just under a year old, the small repair could take longer to fix due to national supply chain issues have been affected wheelchair users.

>> For somebody like me, when I need a repair, the repair that was previously taking two months is now taking four months.

Not because the mobility and wheelchair supplier doesn't want to do the repair, not that the tech is unable to do it, but simply there is not supply of basic materials.

She Reporter: Is the chair of the New Jersey statewide independent living Council has been waiting on a knee block, a function that allows her to go from a seated to a standing position.

>> We are not just buying our medical supplies at the drugstore, like a fold up chair with vinyl seats.

These are specifically measured and made for our bodies specifically.

This is a power chair.

It has various electronic functions and allowed me to elevate, recline, tilt, put my legs up, and allowed me to maintain not only my physical health but allow me to fully participate in professional activities.

Reporter: Colleen says another challenge is wheelchair users are required to keep tears for five or six years depending on coverage, meaning most won't see a new chair for years, despite a part needing to be fixed on the current chair.

>> I specifically am thinking about people who are waiting on their first chair perhaps.

They are newly disabled or perhaps their disability has changed.

Reporter:Reporter: Her sentiments are echoed by Rutgers Professor and chair of the New Jersey disability action committee, Javier Robles.

>> Imagine yourself, you are, ready to go to work and someone basically cuts your legs off.

Over all of a sudden you can't move.

You have to stay in one place.

That's basically what it's like for myself and I'm sure many other people with disabilities.

Reporter: The 56-year-old, who uses a $14,000 wheelchair, recently shared frustrations after he faced long delays for a motor to be fixed.

It's not just that if I don't have a wheelchair I can't get anywhere.

We are not just talking about one person.

We are talking economic wages for more than one person, a loss of job opportunity and in some instances, people getting fired.

I had to wait at 1.6 months.

That was -- I had to wait at one point for six months to get apart part for the chair.

Reporter: They say the ramifications of not having a properly prepared wheelchair extend well beyond needing it fixed.

They now hope New Jersey will begin to draft some type of legislation that includes routine wheelchair maintenance to expedite repairs.

I'm Raven Santana.

Briana: ThatBriana: does it for us tonight, but don't forget to download the "NJ Spotlight News," podcast so you can listen anytime.

I am Briand of Vannozzi.

Thank you for being with us.

We will see you here tomorrow.

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♪