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Behind the Headlines

Behind the Headlines

Take a sneak peek into NJ COPS Magazine’s July 2015 cover story and look at some of the headlines NJ State PBA President Pat Colligan and Executive Vice-President Marc Kovar made during their first year of leadership. For their full reactions to making headlines, turn to NJ COPS Magazine’s July 2015 issue. 


Legislators praise PBA support on Election Day

The first initiative President Colligan announced targeted building, or rebuilding, relationships with every senator and assembly rep in the state legislature. At the time he and Kovar didn’t know where this effort would lead exactly, but a big payoff came with the impact members made on June 2 by staging a big effort to support PBA-centric candidates who needed help to win their primary elections.

PBA members come to Trenton for a day they will never forget

Another brainstorm that came up 20 minutes or so after taking office called for PBA Day at the state legislature on Oct. 16. Colligan asked Locals to send groups to attend committee meetings and a general assembly meeting after lunch. The idea was for legislators to see women and men clad in their PBA shirts walking the halls and letting them know the organization was going to be a presence.

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Rallying to make a stand against the governor in LBI

The governor announced he was having a “Town Hall” meeting on the hallowed ground in Long Beach Island where PBA members combined with FMBA and NJEA members to build one of the playgrounds as part of the Where Angels Play movement on July 22. He arrived to find an alliance of law enforcement officers, firefighters and teachers gathered for a rally to show the strength of public employees amidst his rhetoric.

Atlantic City PD merger defeated

Atlantic City Local 24 called the NJ State PBA in March asking for help to thwart an Atlantic County effort to execute a Camden County-type merger of law enforcement officers.

Unanimous approval for NJSPBA PAC Fund

To bring more bite to the political action the organization had taken through the first six months of their leadership, Colligan and Kovar heard that a Political Action Committee (PAC) Fund would be the best move. They had been mulling bringing the concept to the membership since the annual convention in September.

PBA a perfect fit for new Salem County Corrections Local

The first PBA Local in Salem County realized it had to vote to leave the other labor organization in a PERC Election in December after a team from the state office made a moving presentation.

Union-Hudson prison regionalization defeated

In April, Union County Freeholders were on the verge of voting to close the county corrections facility and combine with operations in Hudson County.

Filed Under: Second Story Tagged With: july 2015

Government Affairs

Government Affairs

Sizing up Christie’s run for President

            Now that Chris Christie has announced he is a Republican candidate for President, the question that is most often obviously asked is, “Can he win?” There are plenty of scenarios that can lead to starkly different answers. The second question that tends to follow is “Will he step down as governor?” That question appears to have been answered. But unless something seismic occurs, in the state or in the race, New Jersey is in for an unprecedented and complex time for at least the next eight months.

To win the nomination, an individual needs to rely on a number of fleeting factors: money, personality, experience, determination, message, timing and luck. It would take far more than a magazine article to properly analyze how Christie shapes up to these factors. So let’s take a few key points that lie ahead of the campaign.

The Christie haters and the New Jersey press have obviously made up their minds about his chances. Many articles following his announcement, including some from national media outlets, refer to the campaign as a “long shot” or “four years too late.” But in the bright light of political reality, that may be a bit premature.

The most important factor, outside of the candidate themselves, is money. Candidates will raise, and spend, tens of millions of dollars each the next few months. But candidates who lose in early primaries will see that that their donors will move on to give to others they perceive can win. When the money dries up, candidates quickly drop out.

There is little doubt Christie will be able to raise significant sums of money to stay in the race well into 2016. A negative story, a bad debate performance or a loss in an early primary tends to dry up donations and that almost instantly ends their campaign. But Christie is a great fundraiser and he has developed a team of mega-rich donors and a “Super PAC” that practically assures he will not run out of money during his race. Access to campaign cash means he will continue to travel, run ads and push his message to compete with his negative polling numbers.

The current polls seem to indicate that Christie is a second-tier candidate, but they are in reality a snapshot in the past and often they teach candidates how to fix themselves or hurt their opponents enough to move up. Plus, polls on Christie’s duties in New Jersey take into account Democrats and independents who have soured on their prior acceptance, and they represent a group that is mainly irrelevant in a GOP Primary. In many ways, political spin can be employed to use those numbers to build the Christie message for President – that he doesn’t need to be loved to be effective and that he is just what the country needs now.

We are far too close to the situation to see the entire picture. The Presidential race won’t actually get to us until the Republican Primary in June 2016. But the real race for the nomination begins in February and March when voters go to the polls in for primary elections in Iowa, New Hampshire and other key states. And that is important to remember. Chris Christie is no longer speaking to a New Jersey audience, and he is not at all concerned if the Star-Ledger editorial board approves of him or whether public employees picket his appearances.

New Jersey residents need to remember who Chris Christie is trying to impress. GOP primary voters tend to be more conservative than the average New Jersey voter, and they were not paying attention to whether the governor called pensions a “sacred trust” or whether he intentionally underfunded the pension system. So a protest from New Jersey employees is only going to set the governor up nicely to roll into his stump speech about “telling it like it is” and “making hard decisions.” And that, quite honestly, is going to drive New Jersey public employees to the brink of insanity.

There is no question, regardless of how one feels about him, that the governor has a gift for public speaking and for conveying authority and conviction. That doesn’t mean what he says is accurate, but in Presidential politics accuracy is less effective than the delivery and the message itself. Compared to the field of more than a dozen GOP candidates, Chris Christie is not going to lose a debate on style unless he decides to mock, ridicule or personally attack a fellow candidate. Other candidates, however, know he can be baited to attack and some of them are likely dreaming for a sit-down-and-shut-up moment. That may work, to some effect, in Jersey but it simply won’t be viewed as Presidential in a Primary campaign.

Christie’s opponents have lots of ammo. The economy here lags behind other states. He has fluctuated his positions on some core conservative GOP issues. He is far too close to Democrats for some, and I am sure the picture of him hugging President Obama after Hurricane Sandy hit is going to find its way into mailboxes and on TV if he starts moving up the ranks. That is even before you mention the “Bridgegate” issue. And he isn’t running against Barbara Buono this time around, so rest assured if opposing candidates need to use their opposition research on him, they will hit the governor where it hurts.

Christie’s chances to win the GOP nomination hinge in many ways on winning an early primary, notably New Hampshire. If he gets blown out there, the national media will immediately write him off and voters in other primary states will look elsewhere. Which means he will probably be in New Hampshire, and other early primary states, as much as he is in New Jersey. That is necessary for his run for office but probably not conducive to governing here. Christie has given every indication, publicly and privately, that he has no intention to leave office early. Nobody, therefore, should be looking for him to call it a day in Trenton and move on.

With so many candidates in the race there is a great deal of opportunity to either break free or fall behind the pack. While the odds still don’t favor him winning the nomination, we are really only in the pre-game warm-up to the event itself. Which means there will be a lot less governing and a lot more politics driving the agenda in the state for the near future.

Filed Under: Government Affairs Tagged With: july 2015

PBA Legal Corner

PBA Legal Corner

Politics trumps law in pension decision

The disappointing decision of the New Jersey Supreme Court refusing to enforce the provisions of Chapter 78, which provide for mandatory pension contributions by the state, is not just legally incorrect and morally unfair. It is also an abdication of the court’s duty to enforce clear employee rights because of its fear of the political ramifications that might ensue. Of course, making decisions without concern for political consequences is precisely what courts are created and sworn to do – make unpopular rulings which, in the long run, uphold the rule of law. The analysis contained in the Supreme Court’s decision is an unfortunate example of an abdication of its core judicial responsibility.

By now you all know the basic facts. After years of underfunding, Chapter 78 was specifically enacted to require that the state make its required contributions to the pension systems. It created a contract promising that each year the amount to be paid would be ratcheted up in one-seventh increments, meaning the full actuarial contribution would not even be made for seven years. Nonetheless, it was a major improvement to the chronic lack of virtually any funding. The governor made the first two annual payments, but since that time has used his line- item veto to avoid payment of even these limited statutory amounts. On behalf of the NJ State PBA, we sued the governor for his breach of the contractual promise contained in the very law he pushed as the solution to the pension problem.

It bears repeating that this was no ordinary contract entered into by the state. It was a contract and promise created by a statute – an extraordinary action. In fact, because of chronic underfunding of the pension plans, we worked very hard to ensure that Chapter 78 contained language that was both crystal clear and impossible for a court to ignore. Provisions were inserted to make certain that the contributions to be made by the state were not just aspirational – they are an explicit statutory “contract” with each state employee. Moreover, to avoid technical legal defenses, Chapter 78 included language that any pension participant or union could sue the state to enforce that contractual right, and that the state even waived “sovereign immunity” – its defense when we previously sought to enforce the contract right in federal court.

Notwithstanding all the foregoing, the court ruled 5-2 that the legislature – and governor – did not have the legal authority to “create” such a contract, because provisions of the New Jersey Constitution known as the Debt Limitation Clause and the Appropriations Clause prohibit any legislature from requiring a specific monetary payment to be made by future legislatures or the governor without voter approval. In effect, the court held that the state did not have the authority to enter into this contract. While it did not declare the statute unconstitutional, as the governor contended, it effectively declared the component requiring state funding to be legally unenforceable. Of course, the New Jersey Supreme Court has often vacillated on when a particular expenditure constitutes a “bonded debt” which must be subject to voter referendum, and when a particular payment is simply a normal expenditure of government. Here, it is difficult to ignore the logic that paying a pension obligation annually is not a “bonded debt,” but simply the cost of having a pension system at all. And it is worth noting that New Jersey has never failed to make the full payment on any bond it has ever issued for private bondholders, even without such a statute.

The politics, however, trumped logic and fairness. Not surprisingly, the three recent Gov. Christie appointees to the court all voted for reversing Judge Jacobson’s decision in our favor. The two dissenting justices accepted our arguments that there was no inherent contradiction in upholding the Chapter 78’s contractual promise, despite the constitutional provisions. The dissent also pointed out that the state’s seven year phase-in of full contributions was directly tied to the increased pension and health-care contributions you are required to pay. By refusing to invalidate employee contributions under Chapter 78, employees must continue to pay while the governor is off the hook for his end of the bargain. The dissent noted that the majority decision enforcing the statute’s higher employee contributions, while giving the governor a pass on his reciprocal obligation, was nothing short of a “bait and switch.” But the case was effectively lost once the court had split along party lines.

The opinion is particularly galling in that it contains numerous acknowledgements that our position is fundamentally correct; that what is occurring is grossly unfair and will only increase cynicism about government; and that it only digs the pension hole deeper. And, despite the obvious ramifications of the decision, the court continues to contend that all vested pension benefit obligations must be paid by the state – even though it blinds itself to the reality that pension benefits cannot be paid if pension contributions are not made.

What is occurring in New Jersey, unfortunately, differs from several other states precisely because New Jersey does not have a constitutional provision protecting public pensions. In Illinois, for example, there is such a constitutional protection. We had hoped that the statutory language and history of Chapter 78 would be sufficient to convince any court that the payments must nonetheless be made – even without a constitutional amendment or voter approval. After all, the legislature and governor created and entered into this contract – not some errant mid-level bureaucrat. Unfortunately, a majority of the justices did not agree.

So, you now ask, where do we go from here? In the short run, it is the same situation as always – the state is not making its full contribution, the amount of unfunded liability is increasing and everyone pays lip service to the theory that the benefits will still be paid. And fortunately, the local component of PFRS, the system in which the majority of law enforcement officers participate, is still relatively well-funded. The reality, however, is that unless this, or a future legislature and governor, promptly start making all the payments, whether voluntarily or through a constitutional amendment, the Court’s promise that all vested benefits will ultimately be paid in full will remain more lip service than law.

Filed Under: PBA Legal Corner Tagged With: july 2015

The President’s Message

The President’s Message

Wow! What a Ride!

The 1st Year in Review

Author Hunter Thompson is the writer of my favorite quote of all time: He certainly had his share of personal issues but once wrote:

“Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming “Wow! What a Ride!”

Now that certainly would have described some of my trips to Key West during the past years, but I never would have thought that quote would cover an entire year of my life.

You all know the story by now. I was supposed to be in a quiet corner of the NJ State PBA office, answering your pension questions and doing the pension seminar road show. I enjoyed the work and would have been happy to finish out my career there. Things happen in life that we aren’t always expecting. Needless to say, I wasn’t expecting to be sitting at the president’s desk. But I’m certainly glad it happened that way.

“Wow! What a ride!” certainly sums up our first year. It seems like Marc and I just hit the ground a few weeks ago. We started in July of 2014, and we were immediately hit with two tragic line-of-duty deaths and a governor that was intent on disrespecting a slain teacher’s life and the honorable work of teachers, firefighters and police officers that constructed a playground in Long Beach Island in her honor. For the record, we kept him off the playground that day. We also made a pledge to our membership to meet every single legislator in six months.

We knew how important it was to reconnect in Trenton after some very disappointing years from many of our legislators. We soon realized it would take more like a year and we are only about a dozen short as of today, but we will be done very soon. Our governor has kept us busy doing everything but making good decisions for our state. The pension debacle has compounded; he is pushing police consolidation as the miracle cure for New Jersey policing and commissioned the pension roadmap that led nowhere good for those of us in PFRS. I’ve only scratched the surface of our first year, but I know much more will be covered in this issue.

For those that believed in us and showed up for us this past year when we needed you, I offer you a very sincere “THANK YOU!” For those who haven’t yet, we still need your help. Trenton Day 2 is in the works, and we have one hell of a big election coming up this November.

For the kind words everywhere we go, trust me…it really is appreciated. Our successes have certainly outweighed our disappointments, and I’m sure year two will also be full of curve balls, speed bumps and a lot of great successes too.

God-willing, I will be sitting at the same desk next year, reflecting on year two and thinking “Wow! What a ride!”

Filed Under: The President's Message Tagged With: july 2015

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