New Jersey Governor Chris Christie eliminates security funding for nonpublic schools in his proposed state budget, sparking charges from a Jewish group that he is endangering Jewish day school students.
The proposed spending plan released Wednesday does not include the $11.2 million allowance to protect private schools that Christie signed into law six months ago. The Secure Schools for All Children Act, which was passed unanimously by the legislature, would have raised the per-child allocation for security from $50 to $75.
Illustrative: The Albany JCC closed briefly due to a bomb scare, January 18, 2017. (Screenshot from Twitter via JTA)
“With bomb threats pouring in at JCCs all over the country, acts of anti-Semitism taking place nationwide and Jewish cemeteries being vandalized, there could not be a worse time to cut security funding for schoolchildren,” Rabbi Avi Schnall, director of the haredi Orthodox Agudath Israel of New Jersey, says in a statement.
Schnall said that by approving the $11.2 million allowance, the governor had sent a clear message to New Jersey residents that the safety of private school children was no less important than that of their public school counterparts. “What message is the governor now delivering by eliminating the entire nonpublic school security program?” Schnall asks.
— JTA
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