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N.J. voters will decide whether to prevent lawmakers and the governor from raiding environmental settlements to balance New Jersey's budget.

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TRENTON -- New Jersey voters will decide next November whether the governor and state lawmakers can balance the budget by raiding environmental settlements.

Overshadowed during a slapdash voting session by controversies over failed bills that would allow Gov. Chris Christie to profit from a book deal, raise the salaries of political staff, and yank a requirement that legal ads be published in the state's newspapers, lawmakers passed a measure creating a ballot question on the use of money from contamination lawsuits.

The measure (ACR 127) was pushed following outrage over the Christie administration's settlement with Exxon Mobil in a decade-long lawsuit over refinery pollution.

"This money was not meant to plug holes in the budget," said state Assemblyman John McKeon (D-Essex), a key sponsor. "These funds were the result of environmental contamination settlements and should only be used to repair the damage caused by the contamination and for measures that can help protect our environment."

The proposed constitutional amendment is an end-run around the governor, who last year vetoed a similar bill but can't stop an amendment approved by the voters.

It passed by wide margins in both houses, with a 28 to eight vote in the state Senate and a vote of 56 to 18 with three abstentions in the Assembly.

Environmental advocates say governors from both parties have raided the so-called natural resource damages settlements, which seek to reimburse the public for damage done to public lands and resources. But they say Christie's administration has taken the practice to an extreme.

When the state won more than $350 million from the companies on the hook for polluting the Passaic River, less than 20 percent of that money actually went to restoration projects.

The Exxon deal, meanwhile, drew national scrutiny after it was disclosed that New Jersey would drop its long-fought suit with the Texas oil giant for $225 million despite the state's expert testimony valuing the damage at nearly $9 billion.

When the settlement was approved, budget numbers showed the administration planned to dedicate just $50 million -- the minimum required by law -- to restoration projects.

That settlement remains tied up in a legal challenge levied by state Sen. Ray Lesniak (D-Union), who has been seeking to get the courts to throw it out.

The ballot question will ask voters whether New Jersey's constitution should specifically require environmental settlement funds be dedicated "for environmental purposes."

"These purposes could include preserving, repairing, or restoring natural resources," reads the interpretive statement. "They may also include cleaning contaminated sites and underground storage tank sites, funding water quality programs, or preserving open space, farmland, or historic buildings or sites."

Ed Potosnak, executive director of the New Jersey League of Conservation Voters, said the proposed amendment would "establish a lockbox" preventing politicians from covering weaknesses in the state budget using money meant for the environment.

Too often, he said, large sums won from industrial polluters don't end up helping the communities damaged most by the contamination, disproportionately hurting urban neighborhoods and minority communities.

A fiscal estimate done this week by the nonpartisan Office of Legislative Services found it could not determine the measure's effect on the budget, in part because the amount the state wins in environmental suits varies widely year to year.

S.P. Sullivan may be reached at ssullivan@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter. Find NJ.com on Facebook.