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Sen. Ray Lesniak pledges to appoint student to Rutgers Board of Governors if elected
State Sen. Ray Lesniak (D-20) would appoint a Rutgers student to the University’s Board of Governors if he is elected to New Jersey’s highest office this November.
The state’s longest-serving active legislator attended a town hall hosted by the Rutgers University Democrats on Wednesday night in Van Dyck Hall on the College Avenue campus, where he spoke about his experience and why he believes he should be elected as the Garden State’s 80th governor.
During the question-and-answer session that followed his pitch, he voiced support for putting a student on the Rutgers Board of Governors and said he is a cosponsor on a bill which would amend the Rutgers Act of 1956 to put a current student with full voting powers onto the body.
“It fits in with my concept of giving the public a voice and a vote in the government, by putting real commuters on the Port Authority board, and bus and train riders on the New Jersey Transit board, and real environmentalists on the (environmental commissions), not just someone who’s my political friend but recommended from those organizations,” he said.
Lesniak said that he does not think it is likely that the bill would come up for a vote, given how much time it has already spent in committee.
Unlike primary competitor Assemblyman John Wisniewski (D-19), Lesniak would not commit to providing free tuition for public institution students whose families made $125,000 or less, because the state would be unable to pay for it.
“What we should do is increase state aid to higher education,” he said.Mar 3 2017
