New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie — speaking at The Plaza hotel about his plan to cap property-tax increases at 2.5 percent — ripped into his state’s teachers association yesterday, blasting it as an “an absolutely out-of-control union that is used to getting everything it wants.”
The famously blunt governor said the Garden State must work aggressively to slash spending and cut taxes.
Speaking to a receptive crowd at an event for the right-of-center Manhattan Institute, the Republican pol warned, “We are careening our way toward becoming Greece.”
As part of his sweeping plans to rein in spending, Christie has battled with the New Jersey Education Association.
The opposing sides have butted heads over Christie’s proposal to force teachers to pay 1.5 percent of their salary to cover their medical, dental and vision benefits.
“In the private sector, this is a deal that employees would run each other over for,” he said. “The response from the teachers union? This is the greatest attack on public education in the history of the world.”
Steve Baker, a spokesman for the NJEA, said that if benefits contributions are changed, it must be done through collective bargaining, not as a mandate from Trenton.