Driscoll, Alonso, Goldberg Praise Pension Reform for Helping Property Taxpayers; Ask, “Why did Bob Gordon stand with special interests instead of taxpayers?”
BERGEN COUNTY - District 38 state legislative candidates John Driscoll, Fernando Alonso and Rich Goldberg today praised the New Jersey Senate for taking bipartisan action to pass comprehensive reform to the state’s public pension and benefit system, calling it “long needed action to bring fiscal sanity back to our state and help suffering property taxpayers.”
Driscoll explained that the reforms passed by the Senate will save taxpayers more than $100 billion over the long-term and will result in real property tax relief achieved through sound fiscal policy rather than one-time political gimmicks.
“This action keeps the promise our state has made to current and soon-to-be retirees while providing other workers with the time to plan for their retirement like those in the private sector must do,” said Driscoll. “Most importantly, this effort helps break the cycle of unsustainable spending on these benefits that threatened the future economic solvency of our state.”
Voting against the effort was incumbent Bob Gordon who chose to side with labor special interests rather than District 38 taxpayers.
“Mr. Gordon’s decision to vote against this common sense legislation to help taxpayers comes as no surprise,” said Driscoll. “After all, his record has been one of supporting more taxes, more spending and more debt for this and future generations to pay. As members of both parties stated repeatedly, doing nothing to fix this system is not an option, but it is exactly what Mr. Gordon did.”
Gordon pledged his support the special interests while attending a rally in Trenton with labor union leaders who compared Governor Christie to Adolf Hitler and legislators who supported this effort to Nazis. To date, Mr. Gordon has refused to condemn those comments or call for the resignation of CWA Vice President Chris Shelton for making them – something Driscoll has already done.
“Every step of the way in this process, Bob Gordon has shown he stands with special interests, not taxpayers. He sits silent while his special interest bosses compare our state’s leaders to Nazis, and he votes against bipartisan legislation to help taxpayers. Taxpayers need to ask themselves: who does Bob Gordon represent?” said Driscoll.
Driscoll was joined in his support of comprehensive pension and benefit reform by his Assembly running mates, Fernando Alonso and Rich Goldberg. Current Assembly member Connie Wagner has already pledged that she will vote against the reforms.
“This one issue – whether to save taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars or not – shows the clear difference between their team and ours,” said Alonso. “The Gordon-Wagner-Eustace team supports special interests and more spending; the Driscoll-Alonso-Goldberg team supports taxpayers.”
- John Driscoll - NJ Senatorial Candidate District 38 ◦
