A bill that would prohibit the State Bureau of Identification (SBI) from sharing criminal history information for people with unprocessed expungement records passed through the Assembly and heads to the governor. The New Jersey State Bar Association supports the bill and encourages the governor to dedicate funds to ensure the program moves more efficiently.
S2513 (Stack)/A3881 (Quijano) addresses a historic backlog in SBI that has left thousands of expungement orders unprocessed, creating a gap between the expungement and the time within which the criminal history is wiped from a person’s record. This gap creates a barrier for those who successfully obtain expungement orders and are seeking services or employment that require criminal background checks.
The backlog resulted in a class action lawsuit by the Office of the Public Defender calling on the state to close the gap. The Attorney General, Public Defender and Superintendent of the New Jersey State Police announced an interim consent order to promptly process expungements and provide reports on the status of the backlog.
“The delay in processing expungement orders unjustly exposes individuals to unwarranted discrimination when their criminal histories are disclosed to potential employers, landlords, and others,” Assemblywoman Annette Quijano said. “It is egregious that those who have fulfilled their obligation to society continue to face these challenges.”
The bill would prohibit SBI from providing criminal history background, reference to such information, or reference to the existence of the expungement order itself once it determines that there is an order of expungement that has not yet been processed. The NJSBA continues to monitor this bill.
Farmland Assessment Bill Clarifies Application of Rollback Taxes for Changed Use
The Senate Community and Urban Affairs Committee voted favorably on S3405 (Burzichelli)/A4465 (Simmons), which clarifies that the mere cessation of agricultural or horticultural activity on land that is valued, assessed, and taxed as farmland under the law will not subject the land to rollback taxes unless an active conversion of the land to a non-agricultural or non-horticultural use takes place. The NJSBA supports this bill because it will reduce unnecessary litigation on this issue.
Upon cessation of farming activities, the municipality’s tax assessor is required to assess property at its highest and best use, which in almost all cases is not that of being farmland. In many cases, a developer continues to farm the property until it decides not to do so. Retiring farmers, however, may be unable to continue to farm the land. Under existing law, using retiring farmers as an example, those retiring farmers would be required to pay the full assessed value of the land upon cessation – as opposed to the farm assessed value. This bill would subject them to the rollback assessment only if the use of the property has changed.
The bill remains pending in the Assembly Appropriations Committee. The NJSBA continues to monitor this bill.