Gov. Jon S. Corzine must explain why he didn't tell the public that his administration knew that a low-flying passenger jet and F-16 in New York City was merely a photo op, Assemblywoman Mary Pat Angelini said today.

After the April 27 incident, which set off panic among New Jerseyans and New Yorkers scarred by 9/11, the governor disputed accounts from the Federal Aviation Administration that New York and New Jersey officials were notified and pledged to "push forward all the way to the White House" for answers.

But the Newark Star-Ledger reported this weekend that a review of e-mails including, those from Corzine’s Homeland Security director Richard Canas and Scott Kisch - Canas’ chief-of-staff and a close friend of Corzine’s - show New Jersey officials were notified three days before the flyby.

“That is unacceptable leadership,” Angelini, R-Monmouth, said. “I understand that the notification may have contained a wrong-headed order from federal officials to keep information confidential, but that order should have been disregarded before the incident caused panic among those who feared the horrible events of 9/11 were repeating.”

Angelini also questioned whether Corzine himself was notified since his initial claims that no officials were informed have been proven false.

“The governor needs to come clean,” Angelini said. “He let New Jerseyans believe for an entire month a politically-convenient story that New Jersey officials were not notified, passing all blame for this terrible incident on Washington. The federal government does deserve most of the blame, but the public deserves a truthful account from its governor instead of an e-mail with a tangentially-related news story.”

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