Monthly Archives: May 2016

According to the annual, national report released today, New Jersey is the fifth most expensive state to rent a home; only Hawaii, California, New York, and Maryland are less affordable as well as Washington, DC which is counted separately. In order to afford a modest two-bedroom home in the Garden State, a family must earn an hourly wage of $26.52, far more than the state’s average hourly wage of $16.98 or the $8.38 minimum wage.

Deputy Assembly Minority Leader Anthony M. Bucco Thursday joined guest host Steve Lonegan on The Voice of Liberty, a radio program on WNJE-AM. Bucco shared the results of a report he received from the Office of Legislative Services on outmigration.

New Jersey Housing and Mortgage Finance Agency (HMFA) Executive Director Anthony L. Marchetta recently joined elected state and local officials and community leaders to celebrate the groundbreaking of Keansburg Mixed Income, a project that features an eight-story high-rise complex of 186 rental apartments. The new residences will be affordable and market-rate. The developer is RPM Development LLC located in Montclair.

The spring rain deluge has ended – for now. So it’s time to take a good look outside your house, apartment, condo or wherever you live and drain sources of standing water where mosquitoes breed if you’d like to help avoid a nasty plague of those pesky biting and disease carrying critters this spring and summer.

In its continued effort to meet and assist Sandy-impacted families right in their home communities, the Christie Administration today announced that the 34th Information Session will be held Wednesday, May 11th, 2016, at Metropolitan Mobile Home Park in Moonachie, to provide personal assistance for storm-affected homeowners participating in the Reconstruction, Rehabilitation, Elevation and Mitigation (RREM) Program and LMI Homeowners Rebuilding Program.

The Brick Township Council passed an amendment Tuesday which removes as many unnecessary barriers as possible for people elevating their homes. The amendment to Chapter 245 – Permitted Yard Encroachments, allows for access to staircases with an entry stoop or platform not to exceed a total 100 square feet in area and no further than 5 feet into a required rear yard setback area.

U.S. Senators Bob Menendez, Ranking Member of the Senate Subcommittee on Housing, and Cory Booker applauded the announcement today by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development that the Housing Trust Fund is providing more than $3.7 million to New Jersey to help increase the supply of safe, affordable housing available for the state’s lowest income families. This is the first new source of federal funding in more than four decades dedicated to expanding affordable rental housing opportunities for extremely low income households.

Advocates, service providers, and impacted individuals are united in their frustration in response to Governor Christie’s May 2 conditional veto of legislation that would have modified the state’s Emergency Assistance (EA) program. “The Christie administration has made homelessness in New Jersey far worse – not better,” stated Jeff Wild, executive director of the New Jersey Coalition to End Homelessness. “Tragically, about a year ago, this administration launched a campaign to cut back on EA: the last resort for our most vulnerable adults and children, which serves many thousands of homeless statewide

A critical report on New Jersey’s online municipal tax lien auctions issued Tuesday by the State Commission of Investigation recommended a series of remedies contained in legislation (A2887) introduced by Assemblyman Ron Dancer in February.

The transitional government set up in South Sudan as part of last year’s peace accord has missed a major internationally-set deadline thereby jeopardizing the establishment of a lasting democratic government in the new country according to experts testifying at a Capitol Hill hearing today.