BY ALISON LITTELL McHOSE

SPECIAL TO NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM

OPINION

What are we to make of the Democrat Party here in New Jersey, the majority party in the legislature who control what bills are voted on? The political party who holds a press conference in the middle of an economic downturn, with stubborn unemployment and record foreclosures, to tell us same-sex marriage is its “number one priority?” The party whose candidate for Governor, a legislator for almost 20 years, says it will be the first bill she signs into law if elected?

Things that make you scratch your head and ask, “Are they living in that same New Jersey I am?” The state of New Jersey lost another 11,800 jobs in July and we have the second highest foreclosure rate in the United States. We also pay the highest property taxes in the country! We seem to have a penchant for being at the bad end of statistics, unfortunately.

Instead of working with Governor Christie to put same-sex marriage on the ballot – to let the residents of NJ decide – and get on with tackling the issues of economic recovery, the Democrat Party has refused to allow the issue to be resolved democratically. Maybe a name change is in order?

What do we make of a party that celebrates its “victory” as the first in the nation to do away with the death penalty for terrorists, serial murderers, cop killers, and those who rape and murder women and children? Governor Corzine signed the bill abolishing the death penalty with the same cast of characters around him who later led the charge to strip innocent, law-abiding citizens of their Second Amendment rights. This is the same crew who care so little about the Bill of Rights that they are content to subvert due process and the rule of law with a secret list whose names must by now include American journalist Glenn Greenwald and his Brazilian partner, David Miranda.

This is the same Democrat Party that ignored the findings of Governor McGreevey’s Education Commissioner, who pointed out that many of the so-called Abbott districts were too rich to stay on the receiving end of their maxed out dose of state tax money. The same political party that willfully ignored the State Supreme Court’s Doyne Report that showed half of the children who needed the extra state aid actually lived outside the previously named Abbott districts.

This is the same Democrat party who helped New Jersey achieve the unenviable status of having the highest property taxes in America, by supporting the inequitable distribution of the state’s education funding formula. Instead, they have stood by and watched these education dollars go towards subsidizing the property taxes of millionaires in Hoboken and Jersey City, and corporate headquarters in Newark. Our tax dollars are wasted to pay for the corrupt patronage practices of political machines that have grown out of this broken funding formula.

New Jersey has a democracy deficit that the Democrat leadership has failed to address over the course of twelve years. The legislative leadership, with its unlimited leadership PACs and authoritarian control over every bill and whether or not it makes it to a vote, is just too powerful. It limits and stifles the democratic process.

Along with others, I have fought to reform the Legislature. My legislation, AR-99, would automatically force a vote on any bill that received 41 sponsors in the NJ General Assembly. It would throw open the committee hearing process to allow the public to comment on issues ignored by committee chairmen. It would allow legislators to speak on the floor on topics of concern to them and their constituents, similar in the way “special orders” comments works in the U.S. Congress. In fact, all of these reforms are the normal way business is conducted in many, more democratic legislatures around the country. Why not New Jersey?

Let’s hope that rank and file legislators make their voices heard in the aftermath of the legislative elections this November. That we see new reforms to make the Legislature more open, responsive, and democratic – so that instead of top down issues dominating the agenda, we can see a bottom up flowering of solutions to the pressing problems of all New Jerseyans.

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Assemblywoman Alison Littell McHose, a Republican, represents Sussex, Warren, and Morris Counties.