Records Show 31 Other Christie Trips

PHILADELPHIA - Flight logs obtained by MyFoxPhilly.com show New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie used state police helicopters 33 times since January 2010, mostly for official functions.

Link: List Of Trips (As PDF File)

Christie will repay taxpayers for two recent trips on the helicopters, when he used the state-owned vehicles to attend his son's baseball games.

The other 31 flight logs show that Christie used the helicopters to attend official functions, such as Rep. John Adler's funeral and the announcement of the Bayonne Bridge improvement project.

But other trips were to Manhattan to discuss Christie's political agenda with the national media, and to have dinner with New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

On one trip, Christie used the helicopter to talk with The Wall Street Journal and New York Times in January 2011.

Another flight log, from April 11, 2011, listed "transport home" as the reason for the helicopter trip.

In April 2010, Christie flew to meet with the owners of the New York Giants and New York Jets. Both teams play in New Jersey.

In all, Christie used state helicopters nine times to fly to Manhattan for various reasons.

And in August 2010, Christie flew to Newark to meet with Mayor Cory Booker and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

Christie and the State Republican Committee are reimbursing New Jersey for the governor's personal use of a state police helicopter for the two trips to watch his oldest son's baseball games, a spokeswoman for Christie said Thursday.

Christie has paid $2,251 to the state to cover the cost of the two trips to see his son's ballgames, said Maria Comella, his spokeswoman.

The state GOP paid $1,232 to cover a helicopter trip Christie and his wife made to Princeton on Tuesday, flying 75 miles from a game in Montvale for a meeting with a group of top GOP campaign contributors from Iowa, Comella said.

"As the chief of State Police said yesterday, the air travel didn't cost taxpayers any additional dollars and fell under the protection unit's normal security responsibilities," Comella said. "But the governor understands the sensitivity about this kind of thing and believes he owes it to the public to ensure that this is not a distraction."

On Wednesday, a spokesman for the first-term GOP governor said the helicopter use was appropriate and that Christie doesn't reimburse the state for security and travel.