Dick Zimmer

Richard Alan Zimmer (born August 16, 1944) is an American Republican Party politician from New Jersey, who served in both houses of the New Jersey Legislature and in the United States House of Representatives.

Zimmer was born on August 16, 1944, in Newark, New Jersey, to William and Evelyn Zimmer, the second of two children.

In his early years he was raised in Hillside, New Jersey.

His father, a physician, died of a heart attack when he was 3 years old.

After his father's death, his mother moved from Hillside to Bloomfield, New Jersey, where she supported the family by working as a clerk at the Sunshine Biscuits warehouse.

They lived in a Bloomfield garden apartment, which Zimmer has referred to as "the New Jersey equivalent of a log cabin."

When Zimmer was 12 years old, his mother married Howard Rubin, a Korean War veteran with three children of his own.

The newly combined family moved to Glen Ridge, New Jersey, and Rubin worked at the post office there.

Zimmer attended Glen Ridge High School, where he was selected as the class speaker for his graduation ceremony.

His mother, suffering from lymphoma, required paramedics to take her from Columbia Presbyterian Hospital to the school auditorium on a stretcher to hear the address.

She died several days later.

In the summer of 1965, he worked in the Washington, D.C., office of Republican U.S. Senator Clifford P. Case, after which time he became active in Republican politics.

He attended Yale Law School, where he was an editor of the Yale Law Journal.

Zimmer attended Yale University on a full academic scholarship and majored in political science, graduating in 1966.

After receiving his LL.B. in 1969 he worked as an attorney in New York and New Jersey for several years, first for Cravath, Swaine & Moore and then for Johnson & Johnson.

In 1973, he was elected to the Common Cause National Governing Board, a nonpartisan, nonprofit advocacy group and think tank with the mission to make political institutions more open and accountable.

From 1974 to 1977, he served as chairman of New Jersey Common Cause.

As chairman he successfully lobbied for New Jersey's Sunshine Law, which made government meetings open to the public.

He also championed campaign finance reform, working closely with Thomas Kean, then a member of the New Jersey General Assembly.

Zimmer then served as treasurer for Kean's reelection campaign.

After moving to Delaware Township in Hunterdon County, he was elected to the General Assembly in 1981, serving until 1987.

He was the prime Assembly sponsor of New Jersey's first farmland preservation law, resulting in the permanent preservation of 1,222 farms in the state.

Zimmer also sponsored the legislation creating the state's radon detection and remediation program, which became a national model.

He was chairman of the Assembly State Government Committee from 1986 to 1987.

In 1987, following the death of State Senator Walter E. Foran, Zimmer won a special election to replace him in the New Jersey Senate.

He was later elected to a full term.

In the Senate he served on the Revenue, Finance and Appropriations Committee.

In 1990, Zimmer ran for the United States House of Representatives for the 12th District, then encompassing parts of Hunterdon, Mercer, Somerset, Morris and Warren counties.

The seat was open after six-term incumbent Jim Courter decided to not seek reelection after unsuccessfully running for Governor of New Jersey the previous year.

In the Republican primary, Zimmer defeated Assemblyman Rodney Frelinghuysen, the early favorite, and Phil McConkey, former wide receiver for the New York Giants.

In the general election he defeated Marguerite Chandler, a businesswoman from Somerset County, by a margin of 66 to 34 percent.

Zimmer served three terms in the House, winning reelection in 1992 and 1994.

As a Congressman, Zimmer is best known for writing Megan's Law (U.S. Public Law 104–145), which requires notification when a convicted sex offender moves into a residential area.

It was named after Megan Kanka, a New Jersey resident who was raped and murdered by convicted sex offender Jesse Timmendequas.

He also introduced "no-frills" prison legislation, requiring the elimination of luxurious prison conditions.

As a member of the Ways and Means Committee, he sought the elimination of wasteful spending and undue taxation.

He was ranked the most fiscally conservative member of the United States Congress three times by the National Taxpayers Union and was designated a Taxpayer Hero by Citizens Against Government Waste every year he was in office.

Zimmer was also a member of the Committee on Science, Space and Technology and the Committee on Government Operations.

He was the Republican nominee for the U.S. Senate from New Jersey in 1996 and 2008.

In March 2010, he was appointed by Governor Chris Christie to head the New Jersey Privatization Task Force.