the lame duck legislative session is coming to a close and that means lawmakers have little time to button up final bills and other proposals they want moved before it's over the roughly twomon long period following November's general election has been chaotic in Trenton with dozens of measures introduced and committees moving at a Breakneck Pace to approve them as senior political correspondent David Cruz reports it's a time when transparency tends to take a back seat to expediency you might think that a legislative session that began almost a year ago would have had its ducks in a row enough to finish cleanly but you know it's New Jersey and if there's a last minute left on the clock lawmakers will take it so bills on affordable housing reform changes to liquor license laws and yes salary increases aka the complicated ones are being rushed onto or pulled from from the agenda when you approached me David I was reviewing the comments on the revised liquor license reforms and you know I appears at first glance and I'm happy with them I just wish I had the comments yesterday or maybe even the day before so that I could have reviewed them Republicans were forced to sit around and wait for the majority party to hammer out details on bills which need to get committee reviews before they can get a vote at Monday's final session of the year but they'll raise their voices in front of any of us who listen like on a bill up for committee consideration that would raise salaries for the governor and his cabinet and lawmakers bottom line is don't deserve them there's no chance we should get uh salary raises for state legislators there are 443 different jobs in state of New Jersey if you don't know this us Bureau and Labor Statistics that make less than the amount of money they want to make have us make for a part-time job it's ludicrous it's a it's a it's a poor use of public funds lobbyists and advocat KS waited patiently in State House Annex meeting rooms as discussions and Deals were had and made in caucus rooms affordable housing reform which would kill the Council on affordable housing and create special Regional Masters to assess affordable housing needs was announced with great Fanfare except now not so much in my opinion that needs a little more work okay uh I've gotten calls from uh constituents in my district they and actually my town who said they have an issue with it it's it's detrimental to the city of Englewood so I have a problem with that bill right now it's on the agenda um I'm not sure where the discussions are between the two houses um uh you know and I think that that's still being worked through so I guess we'll see what the Senate does but it is on the agenda for consideration by this committee today um and it's where the discussions are at this moment in time are are above my my pay great so the much talked about and still being wrestled with Bill that would help small breweries who want to be able to expand their offerings but are caught in a fight over expanding the number of liquor licenses in the state appears to have found some compromise according to the sponsor it does a lot on uh easing restrictions on breweries um uh whether it's events ability to contract with food vendors um everything they're doing from trivia nights to to having food trucks it's going to make it much easier as small businesses to operate the larger fish to fry allowing for the creation of more liquor licenses around the state will not be a major feature of this bill which like some others we've mentioned here will probably make it out of today's committee meetings but then again might not we'll have to see when the session officially comes to an end on Monday I'm David Cruz NJ Spotlight News