New Jersey Slogan

A Scandalous Take on our New State SloganTuesday, February 7, 2006
THE RECORD
By JEFFREY PAGE
March 13, 2006

DEAR Governor Corzine: Before you spend lots of public money on ad campaigns based on the new state slogan -- "New Jersey: Come see for yourself" -- you should consider scrapping the motto because its inherent ambiguity presents a problem. Anyone who has read the newspaper lately will tell you that "Come see for yourself" can be read in wildly opposing ways.

Is it a positive message, that one must come see New Jersey and its varied landscape and storied culture to believe it?

Or is it negative, that one must come see New Jersey and its weird politics and public servants with their hands out to believe it?

Take the case of Marty Barnes, the former Paterson mayor who just got out of federal custody after 32 months. Barnes was at the center of a $200,000 municipal corruption scandal when he was mayor. Now, when a man gets out of prison, you expect that his wife, his kids, and some close friends might welcome him home with a little get-together. But in Paterson, they're about to turn Barnes into some kind of all-around great guy, some kind of hero. For the ex-con mayor, who still owes the city $16,000 in unpaid real estate taxes, there'll be a big birthday bash next month at the Brownstone House. Admission: $35 a person.

New Jersey: Come see for yourself. In Barnes' case, that's really a joke, right?

Here's the replacement slogan, which is more to the point, more honest, doesn't coyly beat around the bush.

New Jersey: You may think it's all fun and games but we live here and we know better.

There's no question that politicians, the tourism industry, the Chamber of Commerce and other Jersey boosters always want to present to outsiders -- with all their crisp tourist dollars -- a rosy view of good old New Jersey. At the same time they seek to reassure the 8 million people who live here -- and pay the bills -- that in Jersey, all is calm, all is upright, all is aboveboard.

Time for the truth, and nothing but.

Consider the current and proposed slogans in some other contexts.

A nosy federal grand jury wants to know the details about Joseph Simunovich's flights to Florida aboard a plane partly owned by his pal, Joseph Sanzari. Clearly this is nobody's business except for two irritating little facts. One is that Simunovich heads the New Jersey Turnpike Authority and the other is that Sanzari is one of the foremost highway contractors in the state. In fact, Sanzari has done $52 million worth of business with the turnpike in the last two years. Last year, Simunovich sent Sanzari a reimbursement check.

So New Jersey: Come see for yourself. Or New Jersey: You may think it's all fun and games but we live here and we know better.

Every time you open the paper, there's another story about the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. The latest is a report of enormous sums spent to provide transportation for UMDNJ bigwigs who never heard of driving their own cars to work or hailing a cab, or, God forbid, hopping a bus.

Which was more nauseating? Spending $82,000 on repeatedly transporting one UMDMJ VIP back and forth between her home and the campus? Or spending $240 on one ride of less than a mile in Newark? Both occurred.

New Jersey: Come see for yourself.

Or New Jersey: You may think it's all fun and games but we live here and we know better.

And of course Gov, there's your nomination of Ms. Safe Driver of the Year to be state attorney general. That would be Zulima Farber, who collected more than a dozen traffic tickets and threesuspensions of her license, not to mention two warrants that were issued for her arrest after she ignored some of the tickets.

New Jersey: Come see for yourself.

Or New Jersey: You may think it's all fun and games but we live here and we know better.

Let's drop the pretense and have a slogan that tells it plain and honest about the place we call home. The proposed replacement slogan is a little long, but it says that which must be said.

Record columnist Jeffrey Page also writes the North Jersey column. Send comments about this column to opedpage@gmail.com.