The Star-Ledger News

Local NJ politics, crime & Statehouse coverage from The Star-Ledger

• JERSEY'S 6% JOBLESS RATE
Vance Stroud knows times are tough. Yesterday the 56-year-old computer programmer was back at the Bergen One-Stop Career Center in Hackensack, hoping to land a temporary job. His last job ended two months ago.

• 1 person out of 11 goes hungry in N.J.
Even in one of the wealthiest states in America, one of every 11 New Jerseyans goes to bed without enough to eat, according to a report released yesterday by the Food Research and Action Center in Washington, D.C.

• No hotel space for big day in D.C.
WASHINGTON -- When you start doing Inauguration Day math, things just don't add up.

• For Trenton powerhouse, a swift fall to convicted felon
When he strode the halls of the Statehouse barely two years ago, Sen. Wayne Bryant commanded the attention of lobbyists and colleagues as chairman of the powerful Budget and Appropriations Committee.

• Justices block bid to change Abbott funding
The state Supreme Court yesterday rejected Gov. Jon Corzine's request to end the long-running Abbott vs. Burke school funding case, a lawsuit that has forced a succession of governors to steer billions of dollars in special aid to Newark, Camden and 29 other needy districts.

• Where a long case is heading now

• 'Special master' called a top jurist
If there was a job description for the judge best suited to sort through the legal complexities of Abbott vs. Burke, the criteria might include a sharp legal mind possessing broad perspective, good organizational skills and a cool head.

• It's nearly 'Twilight' time, and young romantics can't wait
Harry Potter, move over: Bella and Edward are in town. And they are ready to perform their own form of box office wizardry.

• State Republicans expect party's rising star to think it over and then run for governor
Will he run? And could he win?

• Tossed into the jobless ranks at age 84: That's my dad
I did something yesterday not many people my age get to do. I took my dad to unemployment.

• Pick 6 Lotto jackpot grows to $10.5 million
There was no top prize winner in last night's Pick 6 Lotto drawing, New Jersey Lottery officials said.

• Learning a Giant lesson
They'll be watching next week in Audubon, too -- if only because Flacco will be playing against their beloved Eagles. (Well, they were beloved before the loss to the Giants and that embarrassing tie with the Cincinnati Bengals yesterday.) You see, down there, where they're close enough to hear the Liberty Bell if it rang, they hang green and white flags from their front porches.

• Holiday parties at work won't be so bubbly for'08
Say au revoir to the top-shelf liquor, the 14-piece band and the tables loaded with freshly carved slices of roast beef, ham and turkey.

• IN LIVING MEMORY
Verner Dilts knows that someday he will have to tell his grandson the story of his mother's life.

• A free ticket, but good luck getting one
New Jersey's two U.S. senators, Frank Lautenberg and Robert Menendez, have a little problem. They'll likely be allotted a few hundred tickets each to distribute among constituents who want to attend the Jan. 20 inaugural of President-Elect Barack Obama.

• Deliberations begin in trial of Sen. Bryant
After one more round of arguments from lawyers on both sides, the jury began deliberations yesterday in the federal corruption trial of former state Sen. Wayne Bryant.

• Obama transition team selects two Jerseyans
President-elect Obama's transition team yesterday tapped Rutgers University history professor Clement Price to help choose the next director of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

• Dolphin found dead in river was not from bottlenose pod
Bridge workers found a dead dolphin floating in the Shrewsbury River yesterday morning, but officials say it was not part of the pod that has been in the area since early summer.

• Man gets life term for killing girlfriend
A South River man who fatally shot his girlfriend, boiled her head in a pot and told police he planned to display the skull at Halloween was sentenced yesterday to life in prison by a judge who called it among the most gruesome cases he'd seen.

• DESTINED FOR ROCKEFELLER CENTER
In 1931, as construction workers at New York City's Rockefeller Center set up the first Christmas tree on the plaza, Joseph and Mary Varanyak were miles away in New Jersey, setting up their first tree as well.

• RUTGERS' RICH MIX OF CULTURES
When an Indian student brought her new husband to Sherri-Ann Butterfield's sociology class at Rutgers-Newark, their arranged marriage became the lesson of the day.

• Hanover mayor: 'Devastated' man tried to bribe me
Michael Sesera was desperate.

• Nets, in bow to jobless fans, give out seats and career aid
Of all the enticements and promotions sports teams have come up with over the years, it's hard to imagine any as dramatic as the plan the Nets will introduce today: free tickets for the unemployed.

• Man of a thousand portraits
It's happening all around the world, in all sorts of art media: People made deliriously happy by Barack Obama's election as president of the United States are making his portrait. Sometimes they use skills honed by years of art production and sometimes, like Richard Drey fuss making the Devil's Tower out of mashed potatoes in "Close Encounters of the Third Kind," they do it just because they feel they must.

• Monument to victory
Standing at the edge of the construction site of New Jersey's World War II Memorial at Veterans Park in Trenton, Allan Corless watched his crew of four dozen workers.

• Laid-off tech staffer accused of cyber-threats
A computer technician from Middlesex County was charged yesterday with extorting the investment firm that recently laid him off, allegedly threatening to hire Eastern European computer hackers unless officials beefed up his severance package.

• Closings for the Veterans Day holiday
HOLIDAY CLOSINGS Today is Veterans Day. It is a federal and state holiday in New Jersey. Post offices are closed; there is no regular mail delivery. State and local government offices and courts are closed. Financial markets and stock markets are open. Banks have the option to close. Public schools have the option to close. NJ Transit trains are operating on a regular weekday schedule. Bus schedules vary, depending on route. Holiday fares are observed from 7 p.m. on the date before the holiday to 6 a.m. on the day following the holiday. For details, refer to timetables or check the agency's website at njtransit.com or call (973) 275-5555. PATH trains are operating on a regular weekday schedule.

• Pick 6 Lotto jackpot grows to $9.5 million
There was no top prize winner in last night's Pick 6 Lotto drawing, New Jersey Lottery officials said.

• A recipe for hard times
Tom Moloughney, owner of Nauna's Bella Casa in Montclair, has seen the price of flour skyrocket from $8 per 50-pound bag last year to $48 per bag in May.

• Obama's change will find its way to U.S. courthouses
Already historic, Barack Obama's election could profoundly affect the nation in another way: its judiciary.

• LAND OF THE GIANT
The cuts and bruises on Madison Hedgecock's right hand are two days old, and the blood spilled during three hours of playing the NFL's roughest position has dried and scabbed. The grease on his fingers and in the grooves of his nails? That's fresh, and it smears when he taps the volume button on the steering wheel.

• Tax hikes? Affluent still leaned to Obama
Real estate tycoons are notorious tightwads. Their business is to make money, not give it away.

• Man's suicide in holding cell spurs investigation in Montclair
Authorities are looking into how an ex-convict being booked on a burglary charge in Montclair managed to hang himself with his T-shirt in a holding cell.

• Cost-cutting forces 19 park offices to shut on weekends
Administrative offices at 19 state parks will be shuttered for weekends starting today, under a cost-cutting strategy announced by the state Department of Environmental Protection yesterday.

• In tough times, retailers pull layaway plan out of storage
It's been 39 years, but Marc Cianfrone still remembers his first bike, a green Schwinn Stingray and "the best Christmas gift I ever got.''

• Report card rates HMOs and sees higher scores
About one-third of the enrollees in the six major health mainte nance organizations in New Jersey gave them a high rating for overall service, and 45 percent said they're doing a very good job handling claims, according to a report card released yesterday by the state.

• Jersey on its debt: Time to bond with it
Gov. Jon Corzine wants YOU ... to buy New Jersey bonds.

• P.A. chairman backs a second rail tunnel
The proposed second rail tunnel linking New Jersey and New York City was touted by the chairman of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey yesterday as a type of 1930s New Deal project that will get thousands of people in the area working, as well as improve the area's transportation network.

• Effort to oust mayor is denied
A former state legislator has no legal standing to seek the ouster of Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah Healy over a scuffle in Bradley Beach, a Superior Court judge in Monmouth County has said in dismissing the lawsuit.

• Ex-legislator rebuffed on bid to oust mayor
A former state legislator has no legal standing to seek the ouster of Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah Healy over a scuffle in Bradley Beach, a Superior Court judge in Monmouth County has said in dismissing the lawsuit.

• 'Nothing short of a miracle'
They were reared in an era of government-sanctioned discrimination, boxed in by artificial boundaries, denied jobs, subjected to slurs and ridicule.

• A day worth a lifetime's wait -- Mamie Lee
For 14 hours on Election Day, Mamie Lee sat at her station in a Newark polling place, rising just twice to use the restroom. She didn't grow tired. She never asked for a break.

• A day worth a lifetime's wait -- Eddiemae Livingston
Eddiemae Livingston was down on her knees, scrubbing the floor, putting her back into it, when the lady of the house suddenly loomed over her, too close, imperious.

• A day worth a lifetime's wait -- Shade Lee
As a child, Shade Lee's grandfather worked long hours with a hammer and nails, building staircases in rural Alabama. He didn't get paid. He had no formal schooling. He had no means of protest.

• A day worth a lifetime's wait -- Walter Gillins
Walter Gillins learned early in life that some lines are harder to cross than others.

• As far as we've come, we're reminded we still have far to go
The American people were wiser and more tolerant than I thought they would be. I did not believe a majority white nation was ready to elect a black man president. No matter how smart, accomplished, polished, eloquent and attractive.