“There’s more stress in our state in our country that I think any of us have ever seen. This is exactly not the time to be going after each other. The stress levels are overwhelming. I get it.” – Governor Murphy’s comment this week in response to a foul-mouthed Trump supporter abusing his family at an outdoor restaurant last week. Despite our state’s many difficulties and his failings and the loud criticism by this crowd, Governor Murphy maintains the highest level of support of any governor in memory. He’s obviously way more popular and more trusted than our last governor who had less than half the voter approval rating. Even president Trump has spoken highly of our governor this year and we know that’s rare for any Democrat. But what does any of this mean to us locally? Here at Money Island, we faced extreme government-created stress long before the pandemic.
Friends know, although I don’t speak of it much publicly, that the limited information I have is that Governor Murphy personally declined to get involved in the litigation by the State of New Jersey against me on the Money Island issue. My information comes through our government relations liaison who is, frankly, the only person I know with personal connections and access to that level of state government. Becasue of the sensitive nature of these relationships, the information I get is always vague. I would never hear, for example, that “on (specific date) (specific person) said (specific quote). I would only hear a sanitized version of a meeting or phone conversation. I was aware that Money Island issues were usually tacked onto discussions and meetings on other matters since we are not a big enough issue to warrant our own communications in Trenton. In that 2018 case against us the state wasted years and countless dollars pursuing a case in New Jersey Superior Court that they could not possibly win, was poorly advised, was opposed by local governemnt, was based on inaccurate case information, and that cost me dearly in health and money. There were viable paths forward outside of litigation yet the information I received in May 2018 was that Governor Murphy personally declined to get involved. That was a bad decision that proved so over time. The state has since dropped the case after wasting time and massive resources that could have been used to solve our problems.
I have no specific information that the Governor or the Attorney General was involved in any decisions. When I did receive information attributable to a specific person in Trenton, the name was always removed. My attempts to identify persons in state government for personal accountability were always unsuccessful. From the early efforts of a low level person to solicit bribes to the high level persons who met with our liaison, I do not have any names.
But from May 2018 until June 2020 the meritless legal case dragged on against us. Based on the very little information I have, I would hold the governor personally responsible for our current state of stress and depression that we all feel now at Money Island.