Sen. Mike Doherty on gas tax: NJ needs to spend wisely

Another year and NJ is still the "exit state," with more people leaving than anywhere else in the U.S.

One of the things that may save people from leaving is if our state legislators find a way to prevent a gas tax to replenish the depleted Transportation Trust Fund. But is staving off a gas tax hike really a possibility for New Jersey?

We invited Senator Michael Doherty on the show to discuss how he and Senator Jennifer Beck have strongly opposed the notion of a gas tax. I asked Senator Doherty what he thought about the gas tax and what NJ can do to solve the mass exodus. Senator Doherty said that we need to have better procedures in place to protect the money of NJ's residents.

"We are the worst when it comes to spending. We spend the most per mile. We spend 12 times the national average. We spend $2 million per mile. You have states that are properly situated like New York that are spending $500k, so we're spending 4 times what New York is and Massachusetts we're spending 3 times what they are. So, if we're going to really be fair to the people of New Jersey, when we get this money, and I'm not supporting any gas tax increase, I think we should cut elsewhere, but it probably is going to go through, we should probably spend the money more carefully,  Right now, we have no idea why we're 12 times the national average and 3 or 4 times states like New York and Massachusetts."

One of the ways we can protect the people of New Jersey is by knowing exactly where their money is going for all the road projects. Senator Doherty has been doing an attempting to put an audit in place to answer those questions for NJ's taxpayers. "I've introduced legislation  to have a task force, unfortunately that has not gotten out of committee, where we'd take a look at all the costs that go into construction. Not only labor costs, but as you mentioned, raw materials , engineering, environmental,  why we're spending so much more."

Listen to the entire interview in the YouTube clip above.