TAKE ACTION! Write your local paper about cuts to property tax rebates!
This week over half a million senior citizens, people with disabilities, and tenants will look in their mailbox, but they won't find the property tax rebates that in past years have helped them pay the bills.
That's because last month legislators passed a brutal budget that gives massive tax breaks to the rich, but cuts funding to programs on which working families rely. Starting this week, we'll see the impact of a budget that provided for New Jersey's wealthiest residents and ignored everyone else.
If Trenton had just kept taxes the same for people making over $400,000 per year, the state could have preserved property tax rebates or maintained funding for affordable health care, after school programs, and job training. Instead, the rich will be getting over a billion dollars in tax cuts while working families see services reduced, school funds diminished, tuition and transit fares rise, and property taxes go up.
The headlines are already talking about how next year's budget could be as bad or worse than the last one, and Gov. Christie is already saying he still won't ask the wealthy to pay their fair share. Legislators in Trenton read the opinion pages of local papers to determine how their constituents feel about an issue. They need to be reading about how outraged New Jersey's working families feel about this budget; not just in May or June but throughout the year, or else legislators will keep backing down to this Governor and his wealthy buddies.
Click here to write a letter to the editor calling on your legislators to stand up for working families and against these devastating cuts.
New Jersey deserves a better budget than the one legislators just passed, but we'll never get it unless we fight for it.