By Jarrett Renshaw and Kelly Heyboer/ The Star-Ledger

TRENTON — After a long and stormy session, state legislators cobbled together a new version of a higher education reorganization plan Monday night that supporters hope to get the through the state Legislature despite unanswered questions about its cost.

The new version of the plan will delay the reshuffling of Rutgers University, the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey and Rowan University by a year, until July 2013, so that the costs do not affect next year’s state budget, lawmakers said.

The bill’s sponsors also agreed to a series of sweeping amendments to the original bill that will give more power to the Rutgers-Newark campus, protect University Hospital in Newark, honor union contracts and prevent layoffs on all three campuses for at least 12 months.

Those changes were intended to win over Essex County politicians, union leaders and other critics who had threatened to derail the controversial proposal.

The hearing was at once confusing and frustrating for lawmakers, particularly state Sen. Paul Sarlo (D-Bergen), chairman of the Budget and Appropriations Committee.

"I don’t even know what to make of this hearing anymore," said an exasperated Sarlo, who left his seat several times to talk to Senate President Stephen Sweeney, the architect of the measure, and his staff.

Few in attendance had answers to crucial questions about how much the sweeping proposal would cost, including two Treasury officials who were quickly dismissed by an angry Sarlo.

The only person who seemed to have a grasp of the financial complexities was Candace Straight, an appointee of Gov. Chris Christie to the 11-member Rutgers Board of Governors.

Straight said questions remained about how much the restructuring would cost Rutgers if the state didn’t help defray some of expenses, including the cost of absorbing UMDNJ’s debt and such liabilities as lingering medical malpractice suits.

For Rutgers to take over a school like UMDNJ losing so much money carries a huge financial risk, she said, noting that a $100 million loss would equal a 15 percent increase in tuition.

"I don’t want to finance this on the backs of New Jersey families," Straight said.

She blasted the deal, then said she said it was an "excellent" plan but lacked crucial financial details. And she eventually told lawmakers she would vote against the bill if she were they, sending Democratic staffers into damage-control mode.

To further confound observers, Straight issued a statement on Rutgers stationery an hour after her testimony saying: "Certain aspects of my testimony may have left an unclear impression about my position on the merger bill."

She said that if amendments she had discussed were inserted, "I fully support the bill."

Finally, despite a yawning lack of financial information, the committee unanimously advanced the measure, sending it to the full Senate. The embattled plan still faces hurdles in the Assembly, where it has yet to be taken up.

And even if the full Legislature approves some variation of the reorganization plan, the Rutgers Board of Governors and Board of Trustees have retained a law firm and may well challenge the entire arrangement in court.

That said, the changes to the original plan — submitted as an alternative to a proposal by Christie that got the ball rolling — appeared to have swayed two crucial Essex County lawmakers, Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver and Newark Mayor Cory Booker, who held a closed-door meeting with North Jersey lawmakers today to rally support.

It is unclear if the private negotiations will be enough to get a basic agreement in place by the end of the month, the deadline imposed by the governor, who supports the Legislature’s plan.

State Sens. Joseph Vitale and Donald Norcross, the main sponsors of the Senate bill, and their staff members struggled to answer questions about the cost of the merger during the hearing, that stretched into the evening.

The legislators said Rutgers and Rowan would absorb most of the costs of the merger over several years, without additional state aid. But they offered no total dollar figure. An estimate of $40 million to $50 million given by Rutgers officials applied to an earlier version of the merger proposal but not the amended plan, they said.

The state Treasury Department offered testimony, but few details, on the price tag. A four-page fiscal note prepared by the department also failed to determine a total price tag and did not consider the cost of the last-minute amendments.

"The department may prepare additional, more detailed analysis when the bill language has been finalized," the note said.

The basics of the proposed restructuring remain the same: UMDNJ would be broken up and Rutgers would take over most of its medical and dental schools in North and Central Jersey. University Hospital in Newark would become its own entity and partner with a private hospital system.

In South Jersey, Rowan University in Glassboro would take over UMDNJ’s School of Osteopathic Medicine. Rowan would also partner with Rutgers-Camden, which would cut financial ties from the university while keeping some academic ties with Rutgers’ main campus in New Brunswick.

Among the changes to the plan announced today:

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• Sheila Oliver, Cory Booker strike deal to support N.J. higher education merger

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• Proposal for Rutgers to take over UMDNJ, Rutgers-Camden to merge with Rowan is introduced in state Senate

• A new chancellor’s post would be created to oversee the parts of UMDNJ being taken over Rutgers in Newark. The chancellor would report to Rutgers’ president, just like the current Rutgers-Newark chancellor. Rutgers-Newark would also get its own board of governors to help oversee the campus.

• New seats would be added to Rutgers Board of Governors, including two that must go to residents of Essex County and one to a resident of Middlesex County. Those seats would help ensure the regions have more of a say in how the university is run.

• University Hospital in Newark would get "sufficient" funding from the state and other protections to help it continue to provide charity care to a low-income Newark residents, even if it partners with a private hospital company to run its day-to-day operations.

Earlier in the day, Assembly Speaker Oliver and Newark Mayor Booker held a closed-door gathering with North Jersey lawmakers today in Trenton to detail the deal they negotiated to get their support for the merger plan, according to sources who attended but were not authorized to discuss the meeting.

Their demands included the new Rutgers chancellor in Newark, additional protections for University Hospital and more seats on the Rutgers board for Essex County residents. The changes to the legislation are designed to appease some of the concerns of North Jersey lawmakers, including those in Newark who said the higher education reorganization deal would help Camden at Newark’s expense.

Sources said there is still some division among Essex County legislators over whether to go along with the deal struck by Booker and Oliver. But the support of Oliver, the highest-ranking Assembly Democrat, is one of the keys to getting the higher education reorganization approved.

But it is unclear if the changes in the legislation, which is still evolving, are enough to win the support of Rutgers officials, including members of the Rutgers Board of Trustees. Some trustees, who oversee a portion of Rutgers’ assets, have threatened to sue if the reorganization is passed.

Rutgers University officials said today they have retained the international law firm Hogan Lovells to advise school leaders on the legal issues surrounding the reorganization.

"The firm will augment the university’s existing team of in-house and outside legal representation to advise the Board of Governors, the Board of Trustees and the administration," Rutgers officials said in a statement.