Sponsored by:
Assemblyman TROY SINGLETON
District 7 (Burlington)
Assemblyman HERB CONAWAY, JR.
District 7 (Burlington)
SYNOPSIS
Requires percentage of motor vehicle fines be used to support safe routes to school initiatives.
CURRENT VERSION OF TEXT
As introduced.
An Act establishing a fund for certain safe routes to school initiatives and supplementing Titles 27 and 39 of the Revised Statutes.
Be It Enacted by the Senate and General Assembly of the State of New Jersey:
1. a. There is created in the Department of the Treasury a special fund to be known as the "State Safe Routes to School Fund." Moneys in the fund shall be used to support infrastructure and other projects designed to provide a safe environment for children walking and biking to and from kindergarten through eighth grade. The Legislature shall annually appropriate the entire balance of the fund to the Department of Transportation to be used to reimburse county or municipal governments or school districts who engage in initiatives to enable children to walk and bicycle to school safely. The Department of Transportation shall use the appropriation from the "State Safe Routes to School Fund" in conjunction with federal funding provided to the State by the Federal Highway Administration through the Safe Routes to School program established by section 1404 of the "Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users," Pub.L.109-59, but the Department of Transportation shall give preference to county or municipal governments or school districts that have implemented initiatives on high priority roadways when expending funds received from the "State Safe Routes to School Fund." For the purposes of this section, "high priority roadway" means a highway as defined in R.S.39:1-1 on which more than four pedestrian fatalities have occurred in the previous calendar year or more than eight pedestrian fatalities have occurred in the prior three calendar years.
b. The fund shall be credited with 10 percent of all fines, penalties, and forfeitures imposed and collected for violations of Title 39 of the Revised Statutes as authorized by section 2 of P.L. , c. (C. ) (pending before the Legislature as this bill).
2. Notwithstanding the provisions of R.S.39:5-41, or any other law to the contrary, 10 percent of all fines, penalties, and forfeitures imposed and collected for violations of Title 39 of the Revised Statutes shall be forwarded by the judge to whom the fine, penalty, or forfeiture was paid to the Department of the Treasury for deposit in the "State Safe Routes to School Fund" established pursuant to section 1 of P.L. , c. (C. ) (pending before the Legislature as this bill).
3. This act shall take
effect on the first day of the 13th month following enactment.
STATEMENT
This bill requires that 10 percent of all fines, penalties, and forfeitures imposed and collected for motor vehicle violations be forwarded to the Department of the Treasury for deposit in the "State Safe Routes to School Fund." Moneys in the fund are to be used to support infrastructure and other projects designed to provide a safe environment for children walking and biking to and from kindergarten through eighth grade.
Under the bill, the Legislature is to annually appropriate the entire balance of the fund to the Department of Transportation (department) to be used to reimburse county or municipal governments or school districts that engage in initiatives to enable children to walk and bicycle to school safely. The department is to use the appropriation from the fund in conjunction with federal funding provided to the State through the federal Safe Routes to School program but is to give preference to local governments or school districts that have implemented initiatives on high priority roadways when expending funds received from the fund. A high priority roadway is a highway on which more than four pedestrian fatalities have occurred in the previous calendar year or more than eight pedestrian fatalities have occurred in the prior three calendar years.