NJ Senate Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg looks back on her 30-year career ahead of retirement

After nearly 10 years of serving as the majority leader of the New Jersey Senate, Sen. Loretta Weinberg (D-N.J.) has decided to retire at the end of this term. The Daily Targum sat down with her to discuss her retirement and her time in office.

Weinberg has been serving in the state legislature since 1992 and began serving in public office in 1990 after first being elected to her local town council in Teaneck, New Jersey. She will retire from her career in politics at age 86 after her current term, which is set to end in 2022. 

During her career, she also served in the New Jersey General Assembly until 2005, while holding various leadership positions including assistant minority leader, deputy minority leader and majority conference leader. 

Weinberg said that she did not plan any specific time that she wanted to retire, but instead evaluated how she was feeling at the time. She said that the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) contributed to her decision as well, after having to do the job for a year from home.

“I knew for me, personally, or my energy ability to do all the things that I know are really required of a good elected official, it's not just voting on legislative days, but it's the meeting with constituents, it is going out to religious houses of worship in your district,” she said. “It's all those other things. And I knew that I had come to a time when I was ready to step back and let somebody or somebodies else, fulfill those responsibilities.”

When asked about what she looks forward to most after retirement, Weinberg said that she is excited to be in charge of her own schedule and having the kind of freedom that comes with not having other people in charge of scheduling meetings for her.

Weinberg said that she considers her career in public office to have been a gift to her and a very rare privilege as it has allowed her the opportunity to impact people’s lives.

“Whether we talk about things like banning smoking indoors, which took 10 years to pass, 10 years of constantly reintroducing it into the legislature and 10 years of not successfully getting the 21 votes in the Senate, the 41 votes in the Assembly to get a pass,” she said. “But that is a war now in New Jersey that I think, over the years, has actually saved people's lives, that's preserved their health as they can be in an environment, a smoke-free environment.”

Weinberg also discussed her involvement in the issue of marriage equality and how lives were impacted the day that the domestic partnership law became effective. Weinberg said she thought that she had never done something that's really so little, in terms of the rights and benefits granted, that made so many people so happy, because it was just the first step of recognition for them.

She also advocated for the issue of pay equity throughout her career, most recently by speaking alongside two female professors who sued Rutgers regarding the issue at the end of 2020. The lawsuit was filed against the University for violating the Diane B. Allen Equal Pay Act by unequal treatment in compensation for female professors at the University, an act that Weinberg had sponsored in 2018. 

Weinberg said that the issue of pay equity is still being resolved at the University as it recently came forward that the comparables in the initial round of pay equity cases were switched at the last minute, causing many Rutgers community members to raise concerns.

She also spoke about the ongoing pay equity issue at the most recent Rutgers Board of Governors meeting, calling upon the University and the Board to better address the issue.  

In terms of actions she wants to see Rutgers take going forward, Weinberg said that the University must send out appropriate comparables for people who are doing the same work, and said it has to be done in an appropriate, moral manner and in compliance with the law.

“It's an important issue. It's the law of the state of New Jersey, Rutgers is the state university and they should be a paragon of virtue in this area and not in any place that can be questioned,” she said. “So I'm hoping to see that resolved in the not too distant future. And if it's not, I'll be back there.”

Regarding characteristics she deems necessary for whoever fills her position next, Weinberg said that a necessary quality is the ability to stand up and say no. She said that the bills she passed took work, compromise and talking to many people, so she hopes that this is how her successors will continue the tradition of serving in office.

Weinberg said that there is no specific moment or accomplishment that occurred within her time in office that she is most proud of because there are too many moments that she is proud of.

“I think the ability to stand up within my own party and within my own leadership, to learn how, and — there's no textbook to this —but to learn how to get along without always going along,” she said. “So that when things are not appropriate, that you have a voice, that you have confidence in your own voice and that you can raise within whatever the environment, whether it's the party councils or the executive branch, or leadership in the legislature, that you raise the voice to say — ‘This is not right.’ And so I think those are the moments I'm most proud of.”