By Brenda Flanagan
Correspondent
Some good overall economic news kicked off this Assembly budget hearing: revenues are trending up. The treasurer announced an unexpected $200 million windfall, which Gov. Chris Christie will add to this year’s public pension payment due in June. The bad news: that still leaves more than $1 billion due.
“Can you share with us any contingencies or options?” asked Assemblyman Gary Schaer.
“I’m going to continue to dance around on this point — you would expect nothing less of me. We don’t have a contingency in place, because we believe it’s appropriate to be adaptive in light of circumstances,” said NJ State Treasurer Andrew Sidamon-Eristoff.
Every dollar counts, and Chairman Schaer questioned whether New Jersey’s overpaying the brokers managing its so-called “alternative asset” pension investments.
“I’m not disputing the numbers. What I’m trying to figure out is if it’s possible to do it cheaper. Right?,” Schaer said.
“We should rejoice at the incredible returns we’ve seen in the alternative portfolio. And the fact that we have to pay incentive compensation frankly is a much-warranted price for being able to reap those considerable benefits,” said Sidamon-Eristoff.
But what trends up does not necessarily trickle down. Several committee members questioned Economic Development Authority Chief Melissa Orsen about millions in tax credits lavished on large corporations like Subaru.
“The focus of the administration’s job creation program has been these economic incentive programs — billions of dollars handed out to Fortune 500 companies. And it’s generally true that the Grow NJ program’s gonna favor large employers over small,” Assemblyman Jay Webber said.
“The EDA staff is accessible to large and small. It happens we’re seeing larger companies coming in and making this kind of investment to grow in New Jersey and to grow in these communities. That’s what’s happening, and it’s working,” Orsen said.
Orsen says the program is still new, so they’re still waiting for jobs to develop. But Webber wanted to know whether giving tax credits to one business might hurt its competitors.
“So the only thing accessible to competitors is, if they threaten to leave the state, they can get money, too? From the state?” Webber asked.
“The CEO has to certify but for the award they actually would move and relocate,” Orsen replied.
“We’ve got to stay on top of it, to make sure that we are not overwhelmingly just giving these benefits to just large corporations to the detriment of smaller businesses that don’t have the ability to threaten to leave New Jersey,” said Assemblyman Declan O’Scanlon.
The EDA said it will look for ways to help smaller businesses. Meanwhile, the state treasurer says he’ll be back with updated revenue figures in a couple of weeks.