Government Relations

On January 24, 2024, Jennifer Barany and Al Chanese attended a fundraiser for Tammy Murphy held at the Carteret Performing Arts Center.  Our goal was to speak to Mrs. Murphy and other elected officials in attendance about issues concerning the real estate appraisal industry.

In addition to Mrs. Murphy, Governor Muphy, Assembly Speaker Coughlin and Assemblywoman Lopez were in attendance.

We spent quite a bit of time speaking with Ms. Lopez regarding the bias bill and the governor’s plan to have a bias task force committee overseeing our industry. We spoke with her regarding the pending bias bill which was never enacted during the lame duck session. She mentioned the bill will be reintroduced in the new session beginning in 2024 with a new bill number. Over the past several months we have been able to develop a good rapport with Ms. Lopez and she knows our concerns and has reached out to us several times with proposed legislation which is taking place. We stated she will continue to work with us on any concerns we have about the bill. We also requested that Ms. Lopez keep our members informed about the AG offices’ plan for a task force. We requested that a member of our chapter be on this committee. We had a follow up with her office the following day and they are working to get additional details on the task force to see about our involvement. We will continue to follow up and have conversations with the Assemblywoman and her office.

The Assemblywomen also mentioned she will be co-chairing a women’s initiative in the state and invited Jennifer to testify on the women’s needs in our industry when the committee is fully up and running.

We were also able to spend time speaking with Assembly Speaker Coughlin regarding the bias regulations and once again brought up Daniel’s Law.  We mentioned receiving support from municipal employees who handle deed information for appraisers to have an exemption to the law. His office will look into what can be done. We also mentioned to him again the shortage of members on the state appraisal board and asked once again if he could push the governor to fill these vacancies. We will follow up with his chief of staff.

Finally, we were able to spend some time speaking with Mrs. Murphy, identifying ourselves as members of the Appraisal Institute, and asking her to keep us in mind when there is regulation affecting our industry. She understood our concerns and if elected will continue to keep conversation with us. We also hope that she will address some of our concerns to her husband.

Overall, we feel this this was a successful meeting and encourage other members in our chapter who are friends with or familiar with their legislative members and attend their fundraisers or meetings so that they realize that we are not the Realtors, but Real Estate Appraisers, identifying the differences between the industries, and the need to be represented as real estate appraisers. It is through these continued meetings that we have been able to build rapport with these legislators who are coming around to helping us with our needs and willing to take a personal phone call or meeting with us. By continuing to build this relationship we will be able to have a seat at the table when it comes to legislation about our industry.

Jennifer Barany, MAI, SRA

New Jersey Government Relations Coalition Member