A 15-member "Property Tax Convention Task Force" will decide if a convention should be held to amend the State constitution to reduce local property taxes for education and other services. The Task Force will also decide if the convention should be authorized to cut education funding for poor and minority school children under the NJ Supreme Court's Abbott v. Burke rulings.

The Task Force, appointed by Governor James McGreevey and legislative leaders, has a December 31st deadline to make its recommendations to the Legislature. The Task Force will hold its first meeting on September 21st at Rutgers University.

The Legislature has directed the Task Force to decide not only if the convention should amend the constitution to lessen reliance on the property tax, but also to implement "spending reforms," including lowering the funding levels of public education.

One self-appointed task force member -- Senate Minority Leader Leonard Lance -- is the proponent of amending the "thorough and efficient" ("T&E") or education clause of the constitution to rescind the Abbott funding "parity" remedy. Under the Lance proposal, urban schools would no longer be funded at the level spent in suburban schools, as Abbott requires, but lowered to the statewide average. The Lance proposal is form of "reverse robin hood," a scheme that immediately cuts over $600 million in education funding for urban schools and children for redistribution to lower property taxes in more affluent communities.

The Legislature has refused to act on the Lance proposal or similar proposals in the past, but they could be adopted at the Constitutional Convention, unless the Task Force takes education funding off the table.

"The Constitutional Convention is a 'Trojan Horse,' said David Sciarra, ELC Executive Director. "Although marketed as 'property tax reform,' it masquerades an effort to rollback New Jersey's historic progress under Abbott to provide poor and minority children equitable and adequate education resources," said Mr. Sciarra. "We simply cannot let a runaway convention undo thirty years of hard fought gains to ensure all of our state's children -- urban, suburban, middle income, rural -- adequate funding for a high quality education."

"We will be sending the Task Force a simple message: hands-off education funding, and hands-off Abbott," Mr. Sciarra added.

Prepared: September 7, 2004