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Tales from a small town

Short stories about life in a small town. Non-fiction. Great reading.

Wednesday, January 25, 2006

blow me, then leave

This really pisses me off. When I ran for county commissioner, I called every township trustee in the book, telling them about the dangers of "unigov." That's where they just have one guy running the whole county. BTW: he's appointed, not elected. It just gets better, doesn't it?

Anyway, the township trustees told me that they thought I was using scare tactics to scare up votes, given that I was an unknown and all.

Well, guess what? The mayor of our city (which is the county seat) released the results of some damned community committee he and his cronies slapped together. Out of all the "blah, blah, blah," was this recommendation that our city become what's known as a "home-rule" city.

Now, our paper didn't go into great detail about what that meant. Now, I know why. A "home-rule" city, is where the citizens vote to suspend state charter, and do things their own way.

Backing up about 6 months, I had a county judge tell me that our state rep was working on an amendment that would allow our city to experiment with unigov. State charter specifies that you have an elected mayor - unless you vote to become a "home-rule city."

Oh, then, there's an article in the same paper - on the same front page - that says our county commissioners are being pressured to develop a regional economic development agency, to help develop the US 30 Corridor, which will be the next hot-bed of economic development activity. Well, that all has to do with the fact that our local economic development agency wants to limit good paying jobs anywhere within driving distance of our city, or all of their low-paying-jobs-attracting efforts will be for naught.

To that, I say "DUH!" Of course the rich folks want a regional economic development agency. I told what you just read, to one of our county commissioners. The commissioner said, "Well, it's just in the planning stages right now, but the more you tell me about this stuff, the more I can see you know what you're talking about. Trouble is, it's tought to stop."

To that, I say: "DUH!" (I didn't say that to the commissioner, though.)

Anyway, this stuff is for real, and if the powers-that-be get their way, they'll have all the industrial parks loaded with low-paying jobs in the entire region.

I don't know how, but somehow or another, there's go to be a way to expose what they're doing. But, there's still a part of me that wants to say to everyone who said I didn't know what I was talking about: "Blow me, then leave." Am I bad, or what?

1 Comments:

  • At 3:39 AM, January 26, 2006, Blogger Mahndisa S. Rigmaiden said…

    01 26 06

    "Anyway, this stuff is for real, and if the powers-that-be get their way, they'll have all the industrial parks loaded with low-paying jobs in the entire region."

    Hey Boris: You have been on fire lately coming up with some serious topics!!! You know, on one hand the home rule concept is cool because it gives the counties and cities broad power over their economies. A good example is San Francisco and Oakland, yeah they are a bunch of commie moonbats, but they have city wide medical marijuana policies and if they get their way, they will soon be able to tax the mmj trade. That trade generates over a billion dollars a year into the CA economy, so home rule will (ostensibly) allow the local economies to benefit (given that the state has no provisions to tax it).

    But on the other hand, home rule sorta takes away the power of the citizens and can create a local oligarchal rule, which is not necessarily desirable. All this home rule stuff makes me think of the Medici family from the Renaissance and the nation states that existed then. I DO think that any home rule should really only apply to certain local policies, but in a way, if too many places allow it we will balkanize and not be ONE country anymore. And we cannot let that happen! Sorry for rambling! EXCELLENT POST!

     

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