12th District Legislators Senator Jennifer Beck, Assemblywoman Caroline Casagrande, and Assemblyman Declan O’Scanlon today expressed outrage over news reports that Keansburg School District Superintendent Barbara Trzeskowski will receive a combined severance and benefits package worth nearly $750,000.

“Let me see if I have this straight”, said Casagrande. “This district, which received 74% of its entire budget from the taxpayers of the State of New Jersey- almost $29 million dollars in state aid this year- is going to pay a woman who made $175,000 last year, and will receive a pension of well over $100,000, almost $750,000 to voluntarily retire. Unreal. Just when you think you’ve seen it all in this state, along comes another taxpayer funded outrage to top the last one.”

Beck called on Department of Education Commissioner Lucille Davy to halt the awarding of the proposed severance package and said she and her fellow12th District legislators would pursue legislation to prevent another situation like this one from arising.

“If she’s going to receive a pension, why is she getting severance payments at all?”, asked Beck. “This is a woman who is voluntarily retiring, not leaving in the middle of a contract. She hasn’t been fired. Under no circumstances should someone paid with taxpayer dollars be given a half million dollar farewell gift in addition to a public pension. We will be writing a letter to Commissioner Davy requesting that she stop this proposed severance package,  and Declan, Caroline and I will pursue legislation to ensure that it doesn’t happen again.”

Trzeskowski’s package includes almost $200,000 in accumulated sick and vacation days. Beck, O’Scanlon and Casagrande are the sponsors of the following bills which would address the accumulation of sick days by public employees:

-A-2581 (O’Scanlon, Casagrande) would cap sick leave payments at $10,000  

-A-2583 (O’Scanlon, Casagrande)  would restrict the use of sick leave in the year prior to retirement, to prevent employees taking months of paid sick leave to get around the cap.

-S-680 (Beck, Weinberg) is a bill similar to A-2581

“These kinds of abuses are exactly the reason Jen, Caroline and I introduced these bills”, said O’Scanlon. “Sick days should be on a ‘use it or lose it’ basis. They’re not intended to be an additional retirement benefit. Paying someone $170,000 not to take their sick time is the definition of crazy, especially in a school district that has students in trailers. We will be sending letters to all of our fellow legislators asking them to join us on these common sense bills in order to curb these excesses.”

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