Lt. Gov.: Christie's Delivered on Promises, Bayer to Stay In Morris County

It is time to judge the Christie administration on its record, New Jersey Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno told a Morris County Chamber of Commerce audience Friday.

Speaking at the Park Avenue Club to about 150 chamber members at a Good Morning Morris breakfast, Guadagno told attendees Gov. Chris Christie said he would not raise taxes, but would reduce governmental red tape, open the process of government to business, and make the state a better place to establish and grow a business.

“You are seeing that the governor wants to help business,” she said.

Guadagno cited Christie’s efforts to convince Honeywell International to remain in New Jersey and redevelop its Morris Township headquarters, and the announcement this week by Bayer Healthcare LLC, which has operations in Morris Township, to consolidate its operations in New Jersey—a move that is expected to include an announcement next week that Bayer plans to place its headquarters in Morris County—as examples of that effort.

As a gesture to show the transparency of this administration and her willingness to speak with business leaders about key issues, Guadagno read out her cell phone number and told the audience to enter it in their contact list.

“If you have a problem and you don’t call me, that’s your fault,” she said. “If I don’t call you back that’s my fault.”

The chamber presented its annual Leadership Morris Alumni Achievement Award to Bette Simmons, vice president of student development and enrollment management at County College of Morris.

The group also acknowledged the Community Covenant, an effort by Picatinny Arsenal, Family Service of Morris County, the United Way of Northern New Jersey and other agencies to meet needs of military families from Morris County who have members serving in Iraq, Afghanistan or other world hotspots.

Picatinny Senior Commander Brig. Gen. Jonathan A. Maddux said the research base has 5,000 military and civilian employees. He said the connections with county institutions like the Community Covenant members, and St. Clare’s and Morristown Memorial hospitals, are part of the effort “to address the challenges faced by many Picatinny employees.”

John Franklin, United Way chief executive officer , said his agency’s involvement with the Community Covenant is another way to address the issues face by the “ALICE population.”

The ALICE population was identified by a United Way study as the 25 percent of Morris County’s population that faces continuous financial pressure even though they are employed. The group is defined as working families making between $20,000 and $60,000 annually.

“Military families clearly fall into that population,” Franklin said.

Guadagno said that Christie’s bluntness is misunderstood by the general public.

She said his recent comment that the leaders of the New Jersey Education Association were “political thugs” was not aimed at the teachers, but was a message to the Trenton insiders and special interests that the “status quo will not stand.”

She said the efforts to hold the line on taxes, reform the state’s pension and health care systems, and reduce governmental red tape all part of that effort.

She said that this effort is not being made for the benefit of herself or her generation, or even Friday’s audience, but for the next generation.

“We need to have these fights now so they will not have to have them in the future,” she said.

Guadagno said the governor held the line on raising the income tax on the state’s wealthiest residents because the increased tax would only raise $200 million in a single year, not enough to solve the state’s $10 billion budget gap.

“That would be $200 million that they would spend year after year,” she said.

Besides, she said, if the Democrats had wanted to raise this tax, they had the chance when they had the Legislative majority and had a “different governor,’’ Democrat Jon Corzine, she said.

“We want to be able to say that tomorrow will be better,” Guadagno said.