New Jersey is famous for being the most densely populated state in the country. Almost every part of the state is populated with very little desolate area. 

Now our State government is spending $9.7 million to preserve more than 5,000 acres of woodlands and wetlands in Atlantic County’s Great Egg Harbor River watershed.

A gold nugget with an estimated value of more than $300,000 has been unearthed near Ballarat in Victoria's western region in Australia. 

An amateur prospector found the nugget weighing 177 ounces, or 5.5 kilograms, with a metal detector just outside Ballarat in a popular area for prospecting.

The owner of The Mining Exchange Gold Shop in Ballarat, Cordell Kent, said the find was one of the most significant in his 20 years in the business.

"Over that period the sum total of my finds would be just over 100 ounces (2.8 kilograms)," he said.

"We have 800 prospectors on our books and only a couple of those have ever found a nugget over 100 ounces.

With all the focus these days on curbing gun violence, Governor Christie has decided we need to figure out how to diminish all forms of violence. He has formed a state task force to study what he says is “the whole picture’’ of violence.

The panel will conduct public hearings and make recommendations in 60 days.

Christie said Thursday he has “always’’ supported the state’s gun laws. New Jersey is among the three states with nation’s toughest gun laws, according to the Brady Campaign.

Ocean County Freeholder Director John P. Kelly's daughter, an employee in the municipal tax offices, has plead guilty to stealing more than $40,000 from township taxpayers.

Dawn Marie Kelly, 30, has admitted to pocketing cash payments she handled when property owners came into the municipal complex to settle tax liens. 

The money was stolen to support her drug addiction and she could face a sentence of up to five years in jail. 

Kelly was not arrested, having admitted responsibility upon being first confronted about the missing money and she agreed to plead guilty before a grand jury could indict her. 

The Trenton City Council has delayed action on a measure to cut the salary of the city’s embattled mayor.

Council members were due to vote Tuesday night on the measure that would reduce Tony Mack’s salary from $126,460 to $60,000. But the vote was pushed back to Feb. 7 after city clerk Leona Baylor said the public hearing on the proposal had not been properly advertised.

Mack was indicted on corruption charges in December but has vowed to remain in office. His brother and a close associate have also been indicted.

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama on Wednesday launched the most sweeping effort to curb U.S. gun violence in nearly two decades, announcing a $500 million package that sets up a fight with Congress over bans on military-style assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines similar to the ones used in the Sandy Hook massacre. 

Obama also signed 23 executive actions, which require no congressional approval. But the president, speaking at the White House, acknowledged the most sweeping, effective actions must be taken by lawmakers.

The NRA has announce that their membership has swelled by an additional 250 thousand members since the Sandy Hook School Massacre. 

This led one NRA official to announce that the tradgedy was "our best advertising yet". 

The House of Representatives will be voting on the remaining 51 million dollars of the Hurricane Sandy bill today. Many GOP representatives are supposedly upset over the added spending in the bill for things that have nothing to do with helping the people whose lives were devastated by the storm. 

Governor Christie will hear none of that. He wants the money and he wants it now. At a Bradley Beach press conference yesterday, Christie lambasted Congress. He listed all the states that had been previously devastated by disasters.