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Sherrill signs $60.7B budget

Joins legislators to tout its focus on affordability

By: Katie Sobko
NorthJersey.com
USA Today Network - New Jersey

..... Governor Mikie Sherrill signed the first budget of her administration late in the evening on Tuesday, June 30. [2026]
..... The $60.7 billion spending plan for fiscal year 2027 had been approved by the Legislature at the Statehouse in Trenton, meeting the annual June 30 [2026] deadline to adopt an new focal plan earlier in the day.
..... Sherrill said earlier in the evening at a press event touting the $60.7 billion pan that it puts affordability first.
..... She highlighted programs like Stay NJ, the Affordable Housing Trust Fund and the down payment assistance program as ways it makes the state more affordable and said the budget also is geared toward helping the next generation with the Spark program, aimed at boosting mental health services within school facilities, and a social media research center set to invest in mental health.
..... "We in New Jersey are not accepting the status quo," Sherrill said. "We're going to fight for middle-class families. We're going to fight so struggling families have a seat at the table, and we're going to fight to make your kids' future brighter."
..... The governor went on to say lawmakers are going to "keep working together to improve accountability in state government" because the "people in New Jersey deserve that."
..... After more than 90 minutes of discussion, the bill passed the Assembly, with 58 members voting yest and 20 voting no.
..... Assemblywoman Eliana Pintor Marin, the Essex County Democrat who chairs the Assembly budget committee, spoke about the bill and the importance of the work the committee does to hone the governor's proposed fiscal plan.
..... "This budget continues the fiscal discipline that has become the hallmark of New Jersey's budgeting over the last several years," she said. "It reduces the structural deficit. It fully funds our 47 billion pension payment, honoring commitments that previous administrations too often skipped. It provides school funding, and it does all of this while maintaining a surplus of more than $6 billion."
..... Assemblyman Michael Inganamort, a Morris County Republican, didn't see this year's [2027] budget negotiations the same way. he said the "precess is broken" and has been. He pointed out the lack of transparency in the negotiators between the Sherrill administration and Assembly Speaker Craig Cooughlin and state Senate President Nick Scutari, citing the mad dash to clear the bill from legislate committee late on Sunday [06/8/2026] night.
..... The state Senate approved the bill to advance the budget to Sherrill's desk by a vote of 26-14.
..... State Senator Mike Testa, the Cumberland County Republican, also took issue with the process and the lack of transparency in the days before the vote.
..... "The members of the budget committee found ourselves here late just this past Sunday [06/28/2026] evening, just hours before the deadline, debating a budget that had been negotiated behind closed doors and released at the last possible moment," he said. "Some of you may call this transparent, but the people of New Jersey deserve better than secret deals and last-minute votes."
..... The upper chamber's budget chair, state Senator Paul Sarlo, the Bergen County Democrat, said the bill was the work of "record-braking man-hours."
..... "This budget helps to address many challenges most significantly the issue of affordability by proving over $4 billion in property ax relief,:" Sarlo said. "This budget helps make New Jersey more affordable for our residents."

What's in the budget?

..... Specifics in the final budget bill are scarce: Beyond a joint statement issued by Sherrill, Coughline and Scutari last week heralding their shared agreement on a final plan, there are no other public details. The final budget includes $15 million more than the administration initially proposed. In addition, the final spending plan is $1.9 billion more than the fiscal year 2026 budget signed by Former Governor Phil Murphy in June 2025.
..... The 2027 fiscal year plan would see the state continue to carry a structural deficit of about $1.4 billion. A structural deficit, simply put, means New Jersey spends more than it earns.
..... During the Senate's budget committee meeting on Sunday, [06/28/2026] Sarlo highlighted the $6 billion surplus included in the budget bill. That surplus, he said, will help New Jersey moving forward with the state of "geopolitical forces" and the impacts of the federal Big Beautiful Bill in the coming year.
..... There's also an increase in the child tax credit for taxpayers with incomes of 480,000 or less for each child under the age of 6. the amount of the credit depend on their income.
..... The new amounts would be:
* Those who earn $30,000 or under - $1,250, up from $1,000.
* Those who earn more than $3,000 but not more than $40,000 - $1,000 up from $800.
* Those who earn more than $40,000 but not more than $50,000 - $750, up from $600.
* Those who earn more than $50,000 but not more than $60,000 - $500, up from $400.
* Those who earn $60,000 but not more than $80,000 -$250, up from 4200.

Sherrill on pork spending

..... Throughout the budget process, Sherrill stressed that this would be a tight negotiation and that there wouldn't be a lot of room for last-minute add-ons in the way there were in the past.
..... "I'm happy to work with the Legislature, but any additions are going to require subtractions," the governor said. "I don't want people suddenly turning around as usual and they go to bed at night and the budget is in one place, and they wake up and it's signed and there's a billion more dollars in it. We're just not in a cycle like that."
..... Although Sherrill had pledged dollar-for-dollar substitutions in the budget when it came to so-called Christmas tree spending, her Democratic colleagues in the Legislature found a way around that, introducing a supplemental spending bill that adds member items to the existing and soon-expiring 2026 budget.
..... The bill, which will feature the typical last-minute add-ons common in New Jersey state budgets, amounts to $358,811,000.
..... Included in that funding would be another $40 million dispatched to the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority for International Events, Improvements and Attraction for the 2026 FIFA world Cup, currently being played in East Rutherford.
..... That is in addition to the $77.5 million provided to the NJSEA in previous state budgets.
..... The supplemental bill also includes a loan of $105 million for Jersey City.
..... The New Jersey Community Capital Foreclosure Mitigation Program would receive $1.1 million, and 46 million would be split among 14 nonprofit organizations, including $1.5 million for the Greater Mount Zion community Development Corporation and $1 million for the Maria Magda Hispanic multi-Purpose Service Center.
..... More than $174 million would be dispatched to local governments, including a handful of projects in Bergen County such as $1.75 million for the library and recreation center in Cliffside Park, $5 million for the Highland Avenue Recreation Center in Wood-Ridge, $1.25 million for the Lois Athletic Complex in East Rutherford and $1.25 million for Memorial Park in Rutherford.
..... Linden, Perth Amboy, Plainfield and Rahway would receive $2,175 million.$2.5 million, $4 million and $2.175 million, respectively, in operating aid.
..... Mercer County would get $1.25 million fro Wharf Park, and Essex County would get $2.25 million for Urban Park.
..... There would be $18.8 million for salaries and wages at the Department of Corrections, $9.2 million to various school districts for capital improvements and operating aid, $5 million to the South Jersey Cancer Program for Cooper University Health Care and $17.6 million across five health organizations.

..... Katie Sobko covers the New Jersey Statehouse. Email: sobko@northjersey.com

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