Atlantic City, N.J., Mayor Don Guardian said that he could live with changes proposed by Gov. Chris Christie through conditional vetoes to the state's rescue package of his troubled city, Philly.com reported today. He warned that the city needs the infusion of aid to continue to be solvent. "It's impossible without these bills," he said. "We absolutely need these bills to move forward." Guardian said that the additional state controls on aid to the city requested by Christie in his veto message on Monday do not represent a big change from what is already a heavily monitored and state-managed municipality. Guardian had stayed uncharacteristically mum Monday after the governor's complicated conditional veto of most of the package and some stinging characterizations of city stakeholders as lacking fiscal restraint. Others were not as reticent. State legislators expressed frustration that the governor had waited five months to take action and sent the bills back with a host of changes. Despite the governor's harsh rhetoric — Christie said the city's stakeholders eschewed "fiscal restraint and leadership" in favor of "self-preservation and vacillation" — Guardian said that he supported the specific changes. A day of studying the governor's line-by-line edits turned up nothing that would materially alter the mission of stabilizing the tax base, Guardian said. The city has been counting on these bills since they were proposed a year ago. They were passed by the legislature mnjin June.
