Abill that would create the Fort Monmouth Economic Revitalization Authority must gain the approval of one more committee in each house of the state Legislature before it can go to a full vote.

Passed unanimously out of the Assembly Commerce and Economic Development Committee on June 10 and the corresponding Senate Economic Growth Committee on June 3, S-917 must next be approved by the New Jersey Senate Budget Committee before it is voted on in the full Senate because the bill includes revenue-raising items.

A similar Assembly committee must also approve A-597 before it goes to vote before the full Assembly.

“We’re excited to see it moving,” said Sen. Jennifer Beck (R-12th District), the cosponsor of the identical Senate bill and the driving force behind many of the amendments addressing concerns about maintaining local control in the implementation of the reuse plan. “It has been eight months of work with county, state and local officials, and we’re very hopeful that the bill can be passed before the Legislature recesses.”

Beck said Monday that she does not expect the legislation to run into opposition from the Senate Budget Committee.

“That doesn’t mean that issues couldn’t arise,” she said in an interview on June 14, “The bill is a fairly complex piece of legislation, but at the moment I don’t expect opposition due to an appreciation that New Jersey can’t lose 20,000 jobs.”

Beck said that she is hopeful that the bill will be before the state Legislature prior to the June 30 recess.

“The legislative process always has an element of unpredictability, so it is our hope [it comes to the Legislature before recess], but we don’t consider anything a certainty,” she said.

If the bill does not get voted on before the recess, Beck said the legislation would need to wait until the Legislature reconvenes in September.

Beck does not anticipate any further amendments to the bill but she said they are possible.

Amendments can be made during a committee meeting and voted on that day, Beck explained, or amendments can be made on the Senate floor, but then the bill would likely need to wait for the next voting meeting.

“By taking the time to listen to the people who will be most impacted by the closure of Fort Monmouth,” said Beck in a press release on June 11, “we’ve been able to strike a balance that permits local control over density issues, while taking into consideration the regional and statewide impact the closure of the fort will have. That is why we have sought to have a supermajority on all major issues, as well as pushing for the majority of voting authority members to be residents of Monmouth County, the area with the most to lose when the fort’s gates come down in 2011.”

“After meeting with local officials and residents of the host towns,” said Assemblyman Declan O’Scanlon (R-12th District) in the press release, “the concern we heard over and over again was about development, and specifically about density of new development. The amendments that provide local municipalities control over density safeguards against municipalities losing control of what happens within their communities.

“Our constituents made it very clear that they wanted more of a voice concerning the future of the Fort Monmouth property,” said Assemblywoman Caroline Casagrande (R- 12th District) in the press release. “The fort has been an important factor to the local, regional and state economies for nearly a century, and we have a responsibility to make sure that we have the right balance of interests on the authority board as this redevelopment moves forward.”

The amendments include requiring all issues of density to be approved by local land-use boards.

In an interview, Beck said the authority would not have the power to override this decision.

She also emphasized that a supermajority of seven of the nine voting members of the authority would be required on any significant modification to the plan.

The bill would also require the Monmouth County Board of Chosen Freeholders to submit a list of five Monmouth County residents to the governor, one of whom the governor would appoint to the authority.

According to the press release, this would give the authority five voting members who are residents of Monmouth County and have a vested interest in the reuse of the Fort Monmouth property.

The other voting members include the mayors of the fort’s three host municipalities, a member of the Board of Chosen Freeholders, two additional gubernatorial appointments, plus a member of the governor’s staff and the chairman of the New Jersey Economic Development Authority.

The authority would also have non-voting members consisting of the commissioners of the departments of Transportation, Labor, Environmental Protection and Community Affairs.

Legislators held a public meeting to discuss these amendments on April 29.

O’Scanlon and Casagrande attended this meeting along with Beck and Sen. Joseph Kyrillos (R-13th District).

Beck said all the amendments discussed at that meeting were approved by the Senate committee, including several additional amendments suggested by residents.

One such amendment would require the authority to establish advisory committees, traditionally made up of residents.

“The [original] language was permissive,” Beck explained in a June 4 interview. “It said they ‘may establish’ advisory committees. [Residents] asked me to change that to ‘will establish.’ ”