|
|
|
|
||||||||||||||
|
Finish fixing
the State House The Trenton
Times One of Trenton's
treasures, and New Jersey's, is a deteriorating
mess. The executive wing
of the State House, home to the offices of the
governor, treasurer, secretary of state, their
staffs and the press corps, needs up to $90 million
in structural, electrical, fire safety and historic
work. Much of the decay is out of sight; its
visible signs include paint flaking from the stucco
walls and chipping off nearly 60 rotting window
frames. It's not as though
the structure is expendable. Buried in this portion
of the State House is all that remains of the
original 1792 capitol, a section of roof support
beams pegged together in a third-floor maintenance
room. The rest of the wing has accrued over the
decades, but every part is redolent of New Jersey
history and the parade of people who have governed
the state, some worthily, others less
so. In the early 1990s,
the legislative wing at the rear of the State House
was restored and enlarged by the State Building
Authority at a cost of $64.5 million, and the
next-door State House Annex was remodeled and a
subterranean parking garage built for $75.3
million. The golden dome was transformed from a
drab eyesore to a glittering showpiece in 1999,
partly with the help of private donations,
including schoolchildren's pennies. These projects
represented the right way to exercise stewardship
of a historic treasure. But the executive
wing has been neglected. From Tom Kean to Richard
Codey, six governors and acting governors have
refused to endorse spending the necessary sums for
its restoration (and to evacuate the governor's
office themselves for the year or more the job
would take). Instead, on their watch, officials
continued a decades-old story of ad hoc
improvements and improvisations. To try to bring
the State House into the age of air conditioning
and computers and to accommodate a growing and
changing bureaucracy, workmen have violated
respectable practice - to say nothing of building
and fire codes - by installing wiring and ducts
wherever they could be wedged and partitioning off
corners and byways for extra office space. But a
large number of flaws that were identified in a
study four years ago by an architectural firm
remain, including offices with no sprinklers,
inadequate outdoor fire escapes, dead-end
corridors, hidden asbestos and lead paint, and
barriers everywhere to access by the
disabled. In 2002, the
Assembly voted to allow the Building Authority to
borrow $80 million to do the executive wing, but
the Senate failed to act. Neither Democrat Jon
Corzine nor Republican Douglas Forrester, the two
major candidates for governor this year, has
expressed any interest in proceeding with the
renovation, giving as a reason New Jersey's
precarious finances. But a state that
boasts of its leading role in American history, a
state with an educated and prosperous population,
deserves better than that. Donna Bakelaar of
Raritan Township, president of Friends of the State
House, told The Star-Ledger that her organization
wants to see the executive-wing work accomplished
to complete the restoration of the capitol, and
said donations could help pay the cost. "If at any time the
Legislature and governor would like us to play a
role in the raising of funds from private entities
- through schoolchildren, for example - we would be
happy to consider that," she told the
newspaper. It's an offer the
state shouldn't pass up. New Jerseyans are proud of
their State House. Their leaders should give them
the chance to show it. Touring
the Hours Reservations Group
Tours Facilities Access Admission
is FREE Click
here
for directions to the State
House. New Jersey's Most
Historic Public Building Built in
1792, the NJ State House is the nation's
second oldest state capitol in continuous
use. Discover
magnificently restored interiors,
including the historic
Senate and Assembly
Chambers,
in active use today. Enjoy
exquisite decorative treatments, specially
created artwork
and furnishings, and many styles of
architecture. Walk in
the footsteps of Andrew Jackson,
Abraham Lincoln, Dorothea Dix and Woodrow
Wilson. Learn
about representative government and how
bills become law. |
|||||||||||||||
|
About Us | History | Art | Architecture | In The News | Links | Membership | Contact | Home ©2006 Site development & maintenance by 2Profound Design Studio. All rights reserved. |
|||||||||||||||
