Part 2 of series on the Government Records Council (GRC),  covers what happens when an Open Public Records Act  request is denied, costs of public records, the  45-day deadline to file a complaint with the GRC and why taking your fight to Superior Court might be a better option.

It looks like Karrow dropped out without having a replacement lined up. Flemington Borough will have no republicans on the ballot, effectively handing the town over to the Dems. It was only about 8-9 years ago the Rs had complete control over the borough going back decades.

Never thought I’d agree with a Republican but I have to say I do agree with him on this one:

Today, as students head back to school, New Jersey's "bell-to-bell" cell phone ban officially takes effect. I was one of the only legislators to vote against it, and I want to explain why.

Every generation panics about new technology. When calculators arrived, educators warned that students would never learn math, "what happens when the battery dies?" When the VCR came out, Hollywood claimed it would destroy the movie industry. It saved it. People said the same about streaming, the internet, and laptops in classrooms. Every single time, the panic looked ridiculous in hindsight, and the technology became a tool.

New Jersey has run this exact play before. In 1989, we made it a criminal offense for a student to carry a beeper on school grounds. That law is STILL on the books today. Nobody repealed it because that's what happens with panic-driven laws. They don't age well; they just sit there as monuments to overreaction. Yesterday it was beepers. Today it's phones. History doesn't repeat itself, but in Trenton it sure does rhyme.

The smartphone is the most powerful learning tool ever put in a student's pocket; a calculator, encyclopedia, translator, and research library all in one. The answer isn't a statewide ban. It's teaching kids to use technology responsibly, and letting teachers and local districts decide what works in their classrooms. Discipline problems are a management issue, not a reason for Trenton to legislate every backpack in the state.

Good people in both parties supported this bill with good intentions. But good intentions are how we got a beeper ban that outlived the beeper. Mark my words: schools will eventually embrace phones as a tool, this law will quietly gather dust, and we'll wonder what all the panic was about.

"Scutari’s campaign finance law increased contribution limits and changed pay-to-play restrictions. The OPRA rewrite he defended set aside a pile of new money, expanded the GRC and imposed strict deadlines.

Both times the promise didn’t make it through the mail.....

Residents, legislators and the Governor will have to determine whether that track record warrants trusting the Senator’s ideas with something as important as watchdog oversight – especially in a context where, because of his prior bills, we need them more than ever before."

OPRA ensures that the public has a right to records that help hold government accountable. The Government Records Council, one of the bodies responsible for resolving OPRA disputes, now sits at 848 open complaints, with its backlog nearly two and a half times what it was just five years ago. New Jersey spent millions "reforming" this system.

Hey it’s worth a try right? Why not throw something at congress to demand an update with what they do with federal cleanup money