The Central New Jersey Home News from New Brunswick, New Jersey • 13

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 14, 2010 HOME NEWS TRIBUNE www. MyCentraUersey.com page13 1 Hmnb hool budgets Ed chief, gov am er on sc Schundler doesn't back Christie's call to defeat budgets if teachers won't freeze wages "I think what the governor was trying to say is that he understands how voters are going to feel if they are looking at the possibility of a property tax increase of, say, 5 percent, and they're being asked to sacrifice to avoid layoffs." THE ASSOCIATED PRESS TRENTON New Jersey's new Republican governor and his education chief disagree over whether voters should reject local school budgets because teachers haven't agreed to a yearlong wage freeze. Education Commissioner Bret Schundler said wage concessions from teachers shouldn't be the basis for voting down school budgets on April 20. His comments before the Senate Budget Committee Tuesday contradict Gov. Chris Christie, who on Monday urged voters to "send a message" to districts where teachers have not agreed to skip their raises for the coming year, as he has asked.

"I think what the governor was trying to say is that he understands how voters are going to feel if they are looking at the possibility of a property tax set the health care contribution, which would total $750 for a teacher making $50,000. So far teachers in 17 of 590 districts have agreed to the freeze. Administrators and support staff in scores of districts have agreed to freeze their salaries, and three teachers union locals have accepted a freeze for part of the year. The teachers union, the New Jersey Education Association, has refused to endorse reopening existing contracts, further inflaming a rift with the governor. On Monday, a meeting between Christie and NJEA President Barbara Keshishian ended abruptly after she refused to fire a local union president who wrote a memo wishing that Christie would die.

Christie repeated his desire to have Joe Coppola fired Tuesday in appearances on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" and Fox News' "America's Newsroom." increase of, say, 5 percent, and they're being asked to sacrifice to avoid layoffs," Schundler said. "Some of them will feel, 'well, why should if the teachers aren't willing to sacrifice for their own The administration said there was no contradiction between Christie's position and Schundler's. Christie spokesman Mike Drewniak said the governor would respect the will of the voters, no matter what they decide. On Monday, Christie sounded off on teachers who have refused to renegotiate their contracts saying he would "encourage" voters in those districts to defeat the school budget. "I just don't see how citizens should want to support a budget where their teachers have not wanted to be part of the shared sacrifice," Christie said.

Facing a multibillion- Schundler with an $819 million cut in state aid, which could be as much as 5 percent of their budgets. Many have proposed local budgets that include layoffs, program cuts and charges for activities like varsity sports. Appearing on CNBC's "Squawk Box" Tuesday, Christie said no teacher layoffs would be needed if educators across the state accepted a one-year wage freeze and contributed 1.5 percent of their salary toward health care costs. He then suggested that the state teachers union waive its $730 annual dues to off dollar deficit, Christie has proposed a $29.3 billion budget that slashes aid to school districts, cities and towns, senior citizens and higher education. He went on national television Tuesday morning to defend his tough-love spending plan, as a new poll showed 44 percent of voters are dissatisfied with the budget, twice the number who said they are satisfied with the plan.

The Senate budge panel grilled Schundler on the education budget Tuesday. School districts across the state are grappling BRIEFS Port Authority payroll up $15M ALBANY, N.Y.:A government watchdog's report shows the payroll at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey grew by more than $15 million from 2008 to 2009. The Empire Center for New York State Policy, part of the fiscally conservative Manhattan Institute, found 54 authority employees made more than $200,000 last year, much of it overtime. The top salary went to Executive Director Christopher Ward. He was paid more than $304,000.

About 2,600 employees listed in the $665 million payroll made more than $100,000. The authority employs more than 7,000 people. The authority runs airports, seaports, the PATH rail system, tunnels, bridges, a bus terminal and the World Trade Center site. J. soldier dies in Afgahn crash RAMSEY: A soldier from New Jersey has been killed in Afghanistan.

The Department of Defense said Tuesday that 23-year-old Army Cpl. Michael D. Jankiewicz of Ramsey died Friday when the CV-22 Osprey aircraft in which he was riding crashed during a combat operation in Zabul Province. Two Air Force crew members and a government contractor also were killed. The Army said the crash did not result from enemy Fire.

Jankiewicz was an Army Ranger, assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, based at Fort Benning, Ga. He was on his second tour in Afghanistan. He also had deployed twice to Iraq. He was a graduate of Bergen County Technical High School and enlisted in July 2006. He is survived by his mother, Serena, of Ramsey, and his father, Anthony, of Stroudsburg, Pa.

James appeals pair's conviction Teen denies killing five, including engaged couple Supporters greet former Newark Mayor Sharpe James as he arrives at Newark Penn Station after an 18-month prison term on April 6. Rnirnijm Vv'r Kt THE ASSOCIATED PRESS PHILADELPHIA Federal prosecutors pressed Tuesday for a five-term mayor of Newark to be sent back to prison to serve more than 27 months for steering sweetheart land deals to his mistress. However, a lawyer for 74-year-old Sharpe James asked an appeals court Tuesday to reverse the pair's convictions. James left prison this month to serve out his sentence in a halfway house. The ex-girlfriend has completed her 15-month sentence.

"Do you people really want a new trial? I think the U.S. attorney will pounce on that. Wow. OK," 3rd Circuit Judge Dolores Sloviter said during arguments Tuesday. A jury in 2008 convicted James of helping Riley get the nod to redevelop nine rundown lots in Newark.

She quickly flipped them, getting $665,000 for her $46,000 investment, prosecutors said. They argue that U.S. District Judge William Martini ignored those illegal gains at sentencing, resulting in greatly reduced terms. They had sought 20 years for James, a Democrat who served as Newark's mayor from 1986 to 2006. guilty to the charges, which carry a possible life sentence upon conviction.

Hudson County prosecutor Edward DeFazio said "great detective work" by his office's homicide squad and Jersey City detectives then tied Shiquan Bellamy to three prior murders, and additional charges were brought against him. "What disturbs me the most is how a 19-year-old can be involved in this depraved, gratuitous killing," DeFazio said. Bellamy is charged in the Feb. 2 felony murders of cousins Mileak Richardson and Lester "Bleek" Thompson, who prosecutors say he set up and then robbed of cash, cell phones and drugs. Hakeem Lester and Ronald Lawrence are charged with Bellamy in the killings of Richardson and Thompson.

Lester and Lawrence, both 21, have pleaded not guilty. DeFazio said in an added twist Lawrence is the brother of Darmelia Lawrence, the woman charged with Bellamy in the killings of the engaged couple. Bellamy also is charged with shooting and killing Lamonte Wright, 20, on March 27. The incident did not involve robbery or an altercation, according to DeFazio. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS JERSEY CITY A teenager has been charged with killing five people including a couple on the day of their engagement party during a two-month crime spree a veteran prosecutor called one of the most extraordinary displays of wanton, gratuitous violence he's ever seen.

Shiquan Bellamy, 19, on Tuesday pleaded not guilty to all five slayings. He appeared in a New Jersey courtroom while wearing dark-green prison scrubs and cuffed at the waist and wrists, answering "yes, sir" in a barely audible whisper to a judge's questions. Prosecutors had charged Bellamy in the April 4 shooting deaths of Michael Muchiaki, 27, and his fiancee, Nia Haqq, 25, who were returning to their Jersey City home from their engagement party Easter Sunday when they were killed during what police say was a botched carjacking. Bellamy, also of Jersey City, is charged in that case with felony murder, armed robbery and weapons offenses along with his cousin Latonia Bellamy, 19, and Darmelia Lawrence, also 19. The two women have pleaded not government lacked evidence to prove James ever intervened on Riley's behalf in the land deals.

He also argued that James did not directly benefit from them. "As a matter of law, can the benefit be something other than dollars and cents?" Sloviter asked. "Isn't it enough that he got whatever kind of pleasure he got?" Bowman conceded that benefits can be of the noncash kind. However, he said, the government still has to prove that James engaged in some form of deception and benefited from it. He also challenges the government's request that the jury "send a message" by convicting the long-powerful mayor.

Jurors concluded the five-term mayor failed in his duty to disclose his relationship with Riley before signing city contracts to sell her the land. "The city lost the honest services of a mayor who was using his official power to, behind the scenes, transfer valuable properties to his girlfriend," Assistant U.S. Attorney Norman Gross argued Tuesday. The other victims, he said, were developers who hoped to acquire the nine lots and would have actually redeveloped them. Both defendants were convicted of fraud and conspiracy, but James was also convicted of the "theft of honest services." The U.S.

Supreme Court is reviewing whether the language of the "honest services" statute is unconstitutionally vague. Sloviter suggested that the panel weighing James' appeal might wait for the high court decision expected by June before issuing its opinion in James' case. James' lawyer, Alan Dexter Bowman, said the ORTHODONTIC SPECIALIST P.C. Michael Donato Jr. DMD NJ Specialty permit 3884 Kean U.

officer fires at driver HILLSIDE: Officials at Kean University said a university police officer fired two shots at a driver who tried to run him over while fleeing the scene of a parking lot car break-in. University spokesman Stephen Hudik said the officer was hit slightly by the suspect's car shortly after 9 a.m. Tuesday. The officer was treated and released from University Hospital in Newark. His name was not released.

Hudik said it was unclear whether the officer's shots struck anything. He said the suspect's car was later found abandoned in Hillside. The Union County Prosecutor's Office is investigating. Vandals deface old gravestones EGG HARBOR CITY: Authorities in southern New Jersey say vandals spray-painted satanic symbols on about 40 cemetery gravestones, some almost a century and a half old. Police In Egg Harbor City, about 15 miles west of Atlantic City, say the graffiti was concentrated on some of the oldest headstones in the cemetery, which dates to the city's incorporation In 1858.

Cemetery workers discovered the desecrated graves Monday morning. Police say they have Excellence in Orthodontics for Children Adults Braces, Clear Braces, Invisalign E-bill makes paying for your subscription fast and easy! Each month we'll e-mail you an e-bill with the same account information as a traditional bill but without the paper and shipping. Just click to make your payment or drop a check in the mail. To sign up: go to www.mycentraljersey.comHNebill or call 1-800-777-3455 today. I -s, I' i You're a few simple steps from making your life a little easier.

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