Publications

On Wednesday, September 1, 2021, heavy rain from Tropical Storm Ida caused the Elizabeth River in New Jersey to overflow its banks. Elizabeth’s largest source of low-income housing, the Oakwood Plaza Apartment complex, adjacent to the river, was flooded with up to ten feet of water, trapping many residents in their ground-floor apartments. Four people […]

In the face of escalating climate instability, eroding soil, and economic precarity, the integration of regenerative practices into agricultural systems is emerging as a vital model for ensuring agriculture’s continued viability. Thanks to financial support from the New Jersey State Policy Lab and a collaboration with the Organic and Regenerative Farming Board of New Jersey, […]

Decades of research show a clear pattern that waste services are not always distributed equally amongst states, municipalities, townships, and even residents. Robert Bullard’s Dumping in Dixie first exposed the history of how landfills and waste facilities were often placed near Black communities in the U.S., not by accident, but through discriminatory zoning and political […]

Throughout most of the United States, wastewater and stormwater flow through separate pipes. Wastewater is directed to a sewage treatment plant, and stormwater flows to local waterways. In a combined sewer system, stormwater and wastewater share the same pipes. During dry or moderately wet weather, the system transports this combined flow to a sewage treatment […]

The Scientists in State Politics Database is a detailed, publicly accessible inventory of state legislators across the United States with educational or professional backgrounds in science, engineering, or healthcare, hosted by the Eagleton Institute of Politics with support from the New Jersey State Policy Lab. The database helps users identify these legislators, explore their areas […]

As conversations about climate resilience and food security have intensified, we began developing a proposal in late 2024 to examine how regenerative farmers are adapting to economic, environmental, and market disruptions across New Jersey. We planned to deploy a statewide survey, designed in consultation with the Rutgers Cooperative Extension, that would capture insights on local […]

Our project to create a dataset of historical water bodies in New Jersey began by finding maps of historical water bodies. Two atlases were used to locate historical water bodies in New Jersey. The first was Atlas of the Metropolitan District and adjacent country comprising the counties of New York, Kings, Richmond, Westchester and part […]

Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) programs provide a financing solution for energy efficiency upgrades using special property tax assessments. This approach tackles the significant barrier of high upfront costs that can prevent property owners from implementing clean energy improvements. Special assessments are established municipal financing tools traditionally used for public infrastructure. These assessments are “special” […]

As the New Jersey State Policy Lab (NJSPL) reaches its fourth anniversary, it is my honor to serve as the Executive Director, working with an incredible team of dedicated professionals to better understand and investigate policy issues impacting the state. The NJSPL was created as the result of a grant from the Office of the Secretary […]

If you’ve noticed more e-bikes around your neighborhood lately, you’re not imagining things. In 2022 alone, over one million e-bikes were sold in the United States—a 269% increase from 2019 (Vehicle Technologies Office, 2023). This surge isn’t just a passing trend; e-bikes are outpacing the growth of conventional bicycles and even surpassing the rise of […]

Agriculture has long been a vital element of New Jersey’s economy and food system, providing fresh vegetables, fruits, dairy, and products such as milk, cheese, and jams to local and regional markets. Despite its small geographic size, New Jersey remains one of the country’s most agriculturally productive states, with nearly 10,000 farms generating billions in […]

The purpose of this project is to identify and create a dataset of historical water bodies in New Jersey that have been altered by human development, with a focus on areas with a history of flooding and areas with combined sewer overflow (CSO) systems and explore the spatial relationship between these historical water bodies and both local flood vulnerability and CSO locations.