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The state Senate Budget Committee will hear a bill on Thursday sponsored by Sen. Robert Gordon, D-Fair Lawn, called the Emergency Transportation and Water Infrastructure Recovery Bond Act of 2011. It would authorize the state to issue $100 million in bonds to pay for repairs and infrastructure improvements needed in the wake of Hurricane Irene.

The Budget Committee will also hear another bill sponsored by Gordon, S-3078, that seeks to expand the state's Blue Acres program by allowing municipalities to establish open space trust funds specifically for the purchase of flood-prone properties.

With Hurricane Irene proving to be North Jersey's most expensive natural disaster, Gordon's bills could bring additional relief to Bergen and Passaic counties. The region suffered more than $250 million in reported damage thus far – the Federal Emergency Management Agency is still calculating losses.

According to a statement from the senator's office, the recovery bond measure, S-3099, would give the state the ability to provide $50 million in grants to counties and $50 million in grants directly to municipalities to pay for the costs of transportation- and water-infrastructure projects. The act calls for the commissioners of the state Transportation and Environmental Protection departments to establish procedures for eligibility criteria, review and approval of emergency projects.

Since the projects that would be funded by his proposed bonds are in response to an emergency "caused by an act of God," Gordon said the recovery bond legislation is exempt from the constitutional requirement that it be approved as a referendum.

Gordon added that he expects to encounter opposition from legislators concerned about the nation's debt burden, "but I don't think we can wait for the federal government to do this work. … FEMA aid is put at risk because of opposition by extremist Republicans in Congress, so we can't allow ourselves to be held hostage. We need to act on our own."

Gordon's other proposal would authorize municipalities to establish trust funds to purchase Blue Acres properties in the same way that municipal open space or farmland and historic preservation trust funds are managed, the senator said.

With an initial fund of $12 million, the DEP has bought 31 homes through the Blue Acres program since its inception in 2007. The program allows owners to sell to the state properties that have been damaged by storms or storm-related flooding or that may buffer or protect other lands from such damage.

The DEP has not yet taken a position on Gordon's bills, but is evaluating them, a department spokesman, Lawrence Hajna, said.