NJ Exporting Welfare Recipients and Crime?

Altoona Mayor Wayne Hippo is looking into filing a lawsuit against the state of New Jersey for allegedly urging welfare recipients to move to Altoona for low-income housing. He's been working with the police to investigate crime in Blair County - including drug rings and shootings - connected to former New Jersey residents who have moved to Altoona, Pa.

Compulsory “Volunteerism”

Should public school students be compelled to provide community service as a requirement for high school graduation? If a pilot program, created by a 2005 state law requiring community service from high school juniors, is deemed successful, New Jersey will become the second state, after Maryland, to make it mandatory for high school graduation.

High Priced Lawyers Hired to Fire Crook

It cost UMDNJ more than $450,000 in lawyer fees to fire former School of Osteopathic Medicine Dean R. Michael Gallagher, who was indicted in March on 13 counts of bribery and fraud. UMDNJ trustee chairman Robert Del Tufo said, “the cost was warranted because the public institution had never before fired a tenured leader”.

AC Dealers Feeling Lucky

Casino dealers at Bally's Atlantic City voted in favor of becoming part of the United Auto Workers union. They must be feeling lucky, considering how well the union deal worked out for American auto workers.

Highway of Death

New Jersey traffic fatalities have begun rising for the first time in a generation while the nation’s highway death rate declined slightly in 2006. Last year, 938 people were killed, including 168 pedestrians in the Garden State.

New Jersey’s Top High Schools

New Jersey has 43 schools on Newsweek’s list of the top five percent of U.S. public high schools. Billed as The Top of the Class: The complete list of the 1,200 top U.S. schools, there are actually 1,253 schools included.

Public schools were ranked according to a ratio devised by Jay Mathews: the number of Advanced Placement, Intl. Baccalaureate and/or Cambridge tests taken by all students at a school in 2006 divided by the number of graduating seniors.

Here’s the list