By John Reitmeyer, includes "Also mired in the political gridlock in Trenton is the final legislative approval of a proposed constitutional amendment that government-worker unions want to see on the ballot this fall in a desperate push to shore up the state’s grossly underfunded public-employee pension system. Thanks to a hard deadline set in the state constitution, if a vote on the amendment isn’t held soon, the effort could be delayed for at least a year."