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Sep 03rd
| Don’t ask for more money if you can’t stop spending |
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| Wednesday, 01 July 2009 20:47 | |||||||||||||||||
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The city of Cuba has found itself in quite a financial pickle for the 2009-10 fiscal year, which began on Wednesday. Cuba is starting the year with less than $200,000 in the bank, but the council has decided to…spend more money!
Unable to make any kind of a decision on how to cut spending and rebuild the city’s reserve account, the council has opted to ask the taxpayers for more money. Aldermen recently voted to put a one-half cent sales tax increase on the ballot in a special November election. This election will cost the city even more money. There is normally not an election scheduled in November. This special election will be held only for the city of Cuba. The city will have to pay all the costs associated with the election. Those costs include printing ballots, paying election judges and printing legal notices in the newspaper. It will cost the taxpayers of Cuba thousands more in this year’s budget. The added costs for the election would not be a big deal if it weren’t for two simple facts: 1. The city is already dangerously short on money, and 2. There is no way in the world this new tax is ever going to pass! Is it simply wishful thinking, or do Cuba’s aldermen actually think they can get a sales tax increase passed? If they do, they are out of their minds. Let me repeat: There is no way in the world this new tax is ever going to pass! Why would any voter in Cuba approve a tax increase when the city council has made no real effort to cut back on spending? This proposed tax increase should be the last resort for the council, not the first. Cuba aldermen are unwilling or unable to do the job they were elected to do and they want taxpayers to bail them out. Just say NO! At this point, it appears the council is not even willing to listen to ideas on how to save money. A local landscaper attended a recent council meeting and proposed the city bid out its summer mowing, potentially saving more than $100,000 a year. The city currently does all its own mowing, paying for three employees, equipment, supplies, etc. every year. The last time mowing was bid out, the annual cost was approximately $100,000 less than it currently is. When the local businessman proposed bidding out the mowing again with that much potential savings, one would expect aldermen to at least take a strong look at the idea. But what did the landscaper get from the council? Silence! There was no “thank you,” no “we’ll take it under advisement,” not even a “please shut the door on your way out.” Just silence. Cuba voters shouldn’t be silent in November. They should vote against the proposed sales tax and they should do so overwhelmingly. Send a message that is loud and clear to the city council. Defeat that tax and defeat it big. Then come April, when the city is still facing a huge financial problem, voters should send another message to aldermen—Please shut the door on your way out! Principals should live in district The Steelville School Board has hired a new elementary principal—another one that won’t be living in the district! We’re not talking about someone who is not from the district. We’re talking about someone who has been working for the district for several years, but doesn’t live in the district and will not be living in the district in the future. That’s two of three principals in Steelville who don’t live in the school district. That’s just not right! If you’re going to be an administrator in any school district, shouldn’t you live in the district? Yes! The district is good enough to provide you a job (a very well-paying job I might add), the taxpayers are good enough to pay your salary, but the district is not good enough to live in? And for two of Steelville’s three principals, the district is not only not good enough to live in, it’s not good enough for their children to attend classes in! What kind of a message is that sending? Principals are a vital part of the community, or they are supposed to be. They can’t be a vital part of the community when they don’t even live in the community they are supposed to be serving. The school board needs to make it an official policy: If you want to be a principal in the district, you will live in the district. If any potential principal can’t make that commitment, then they are not committed to the district and they don’t deserve the job.
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| Last Updated on Wednesday, 15 July 2009 11:14 | |||||||||||||||||
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