Sunday, February 27, 2005

Utilities Service Board Gets Another Bath In Red Ink

News this week out of the City of Bloomington’s Utilities Service Board (USB) indicates the Monroe water treatment plant is $2.5 million short of funds to pay for ongoing improvement projects. Less than two years ago this same Board approved financing to cover a $2 million shortfall on the Miller-Showers Park debacle. After approving the bailout two years ago, the board was assured they wouldn’t be put in this situation again. The Board has indicated a total lack of communication on the part of the City and stated it has been left in dark up to this point. Board of finance chairman Sam Vaught said he was “totally embarrassed” by this situation. Tom Swafford, Board President said “I don’t recall ever hearing from anybody that we’re going to be two million short on these projects”. Board Vice President Tim Henke added it’s a problem the City has known about “for months and months”. Concerned about the ongoing absence of the utilities director Vaught suggested “I’m almost inclined to completely shut down financing for the utility until it comes to me and this board. It’s obvious that you guys cannot handle the engineering and financing of these projects.” Pat Murphy, Mayor Kruzan’s appointment as director of the USB has been unavailable for comment.
Mark Kruzan might have been labeled an effective Legislator but as a Mayor, he has fallen flat on his face. Granted, he has been left cleaning up a tsunami of red ink and fuzzy accounting practices from the previous democratic administration but let’s face it, he has failed the citizens of Bloomington miserably in his first fourteen months. This is just another blatant example of an administration that is out of control. The mayor should have been on top of this issue months ago but it seems that when he is in his office his management style is more one of crisis management than anything else. It is obvious that the citizens of Bloomington are on a need to know basis only, and that is usually preceded with a request for additional funding. This is just another prime example of irresponsible actions by King Kruzan and his court of merry jesters, the City Council. The democrats have proven that they have no concept of responsible fiscal management and yet they continue to author ordinances and support legislation that adds to the problem, not to the solution. The responsible thing for the USB to do at this point is withhold approval of any additional funding to the utility until a complete audit of its practices be preformed by the State Board of Accounts.

Thursday, February 24, 2005

Don't Reward Monroe County Democrats

The question is why would House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jeff Espitch offer his blessing to a food and beverage tax for Monroe County? What possible motivation does Governor Daniels have for supporting this legislation? Furthermore, have these two forgotten that Monroe County was a blue speck in a sea of red this past election and what’s more, it simply doesn’t make sense to reward Peggy Welch and other local democrats for their vocal opposition to republican reform. All the while, King Kruzan is wringing his hands in anticipation of the thought of getting his hands on another chunk of our local tax money. Local democrats have come out in full support of a food and beverage tax and they have suggested several methods of spending it once they get it.

After their failed attempt to get State wide legislation through this session they have now resorted to an end run with legislation allowing just a couple of counties to adopt the tax. The Supreme Court recently ruled against special legislation but the authors of this bill have made the argument that Monroe County is at a disadvantage when it comes to raising funds to finance projects because so much of Monroe County is nontaxable State owned property. The only disadvantage Monroe County currently has is being in the control of a group of like minded individuals that want to raise our taxes without any input from the local citizenry. No one really seems to know whether or not we need a larger convention center and if we have one will it be profitable or will it be another Buskirk Chumley? Do we really need a juvenile detention / treatment facility and a larger jail? Currently no one in our local government has the answers to these questions. If this tax is so good for us, let’s put it on the ballot as a referendum and let it be a government by the people, for the people.

Tuesday, February 22, 2005

The Unions Givith, The Democrats Takith Away

In the Mayor’s guest column printed in the HT on February 21, 2005, our illustrious mayor provided his reasoning for not allowing the Gentry East project sewer extension. His reasoning focused on the assumption that nobody seems to know for sure how much capacity our treatment facilities have to spare and how quickly the land under the city’s domain will be developed. Makes you wonder what all of those people that work for the city do all day doesn’t it? What this really is all about is Mayor Kruzan and the democrat controlled City Council want to dictate all planning and zoning, not just in the city but in the entire county. Since this project is outside the city’s planning jurisdiction the mayor has decided that he doesn’t like it, and thus, he has the power to deny it a sewer extension.

Kruzan was quoted as saying “Since becoming mayor, no developer has sought a sewer extension outside the planning jurisdiction on the basis of jobs that would be created or the income that would be imported into the community”. In one fell swoop Mayor Kruzan has cast aside everyone that is involved in development in our community as though they were a pair of old shoes. I wonder; does he not realize that the property development is a big segment of our local economy and it is a source of employment for several hundred people within our community. The last expansion to the Dillman Road treatment facility was based on the concept that future needs could be met. Growth in our community is inevitable and with it, we will need additional sewer treatment facilities, additional schools, roads and larger hospitals. No matter how much our local elected officials try, they can’t stop growth and honestly why would they try? Growth fuels the union and non-union construction segment of our local economy and quite frankly that equates to jobs. With healthy growth, supply and demand are kept in balance which also helps to keep the cost of living check. Growth and new development also correlate to an increase in the tax base which helps pay for needed infrastructure improvements.

In the recently released election finance report local unions came to the aid of several democrat candidates. For some reason unions continue to provide financial support for local democrats, all the while their jobs are being eliminated by the very individuals they seek to elect. Instead of these no growth “green” democrats we need people with vision, planners with rational forward thinking skills that can anticipate and prepare us for the future, without them; this segment of our local economy will have no one to blame for its decline, but itself.

Friday, February 18, 2005

If You're Not Outraged You're Not Paying Attention

Lets face it, Commissioner Kilmer did nothing more than verbalize what many rational thinking individuals in this community have been thinking since the November 2nd election. Radical environmentalists now control every facet of local government and with that, all economic development in Monroe County will undoubtedly grind slowly to a halt. If they happen to like your project, you’re in, if they don’t, your out and whether or not you’re in compliance will have very little to do with the decision. They equate growth with capitalism, and in their book, both are bad. It’s a mentality that runs deep in our community and quite frankly it’s a concept that’s very difficult for most logical thinking individuals to accept and or understand. When a republican speaks out it is considered incivility and when a democrat speaks out it is considered passion. Local democrats excused the incivility of the likes of Brian O’Neal as he routinely vented his anger as Commissioner and now they do the same with Andy Ruff who insulted an INDOT official in one of his many anti-69 diatribes. If they can have their angry outbursts why then can’t Herb Kilmer? This double standard exists because the democrats utilize the local media to their advantage; the republicans rarely get the chance. The fact is the democrats are already working on the 2006 election where they have their sights firmly fixed on Herb Kilmer’s Commissioner’s seat.

In this past election local democrats mobilized their voters with a message of hatred and ire toward President Bush. Voters on the IU campus turned out in record number to vote for John Kerry with little concern for any of the other candidates on the ticket and with that, local democratic candidates simply road the wave into office. No other reasonable explanation could exist when a person like Kevin Enright can get elected? Commissioner Poling surely recognized how far left things have swung. She was given an ultimatum by Mr. Kilmer to appoint a moderate to the Planning Commission, or else. She decided to side with the greens and the rest, as they say, is history. Mr. Kilmer is simply suggesting that you made the bed, now you get in it. If anything is a mystery out of this situation, it is why any elected official or for that matter anyone seeking an elected office would waste even one minute of their time talking to Kurt Van der Dussen of the Herald Times. Talking to him is like having unprotected sex with a total stranger, you never know what you’re going get from it. Kilmer’s level of frustration should be understood, and if its not, your not paying attention.

Sunday, February 13, 2005

Living Wage Cost & Benefit Unknown

Here we go again! The democratic controlled City Council is going off half-cocked into another touchy feely social program that even they admittedly have no idea what effect, if any, it will have or how much it will cost. The Bloomington Living Wage Coalition invited Mark Brenner a professor from University of Massachusetts to speak; he has published studies on the effect of the living wage ordinances in various communities. Brenner reported the effect was mostly positive in the 130 larger cities that have living wage ordinances. The closest comparison to a small rural college town like Bloomington was Boston, in which Brenner pointed out the full degree to which numbers could be applied to Bloomington, was difficult to determine. He also reported that the financial impact to cities was fairly minimal, about $150,000 for Pasadena, California in its first year under the living wage ordinance. Milton Fisk, the local author of the proposal also has admitted that his organization has no idea how much this program will end up costing the City however, their best estimate is somewhere between $150,000 and $200,000 the first year. When the question came up about the projected cost to the city, Andy Ruff was quoted as saying “Dollar for dollar, there was no comparison between money in the city budget to that in the pocket of low wage workers”, or in other words, I have no idea and I really don’t care. With all of the financial ills that face our city, why do our elected officials continue to come up with proposals that simply add to the problem? Furthermore, in a city that has to apply for an excess levy to get enough money to give it’s employees a minimal cost of living increase isn’t it rather ironic that its Council would come up with yet another proposal to siphon off some of these much-needed funds.

With the absence of a sustained cost versus benefit study on small cities such as Bloomington, it is careless and irresponsible for elected officials to commit the taxpayers of our community the status of guinea pigs for their own ego feeding desire for press and notoriety. Of course another possible motive behind this proposal is that the Democrats are simply championing another taxpayer-funded employment benefit program for their voter base. What makes them think social ills are so easily solved by programs like this one and if they were, wouldn’t there be a lot more cities adopting the living wage ordinance? Social programs like this rarely provide the desired effect and when they don’t, they are usually expanded to encompass a larger group or area to bolster results. What makes people think this ordinance won’t be expanded to include all of Bloomington, what about all of Monroe County? In a college city such as ours that depends on a lot of part-time student workers, isn’t it possible that such an ordinance could have a profound effect on their ability to find employment. Since the living wage proposal includes a benefit provision for part-time employees, isn’t it possible that higher skilled individuals seeking part-time or second job employment with benefits could actually displace lower skilled employees? Unfortunately this ordinance proposal has more questions than it has answers and furthermore, now is not the time to risk hundreds of thousands of tax dollars on an unproven social program.

Wednesday, February 09, 2005

Local Democrats Keep Raising Our Taxes

Here we go again, the Democrats seem all too eager to raise our local taxes. Over the course of the last few years our former Mayor, John Fernandez, and the Democrat controlled City spent more than it was taking in. Recently Mayor Mark Kruzan and the City Council managed to push an excess levy request through the State House to compensate for their inability to live within their means. Now Peggy Welch and Mark Kruzan have teamed up to saddle the local taxpayers with yet another tax to help pay for their spending habits. This latest tax will come in the form of a food and beverage tax that is being sold to the public as an obscure tax that will hardly be noticed by the average citizen, yeah right! This mentality of “tax them and we can spend” has got to stop! For many years the Democrats have been in control of the City Government and now, with this past election, they have taken control of the County Government. It is painfully obvious to me that at this point we can only expect more of the same. Hopefully the Republican controlled House and our Governor will put a stop to all this nonsense. It reminds me of the quotation, “a million here and million there and before you know it your talking about real money”. Someday maybe local voters will wake up and smell the coffee, but meanwhile be aware that your coffee could soon cost just a little bit more thanks to these Democrats.

Tuesday, February 08, 2005

The Irony To Vi Simpson's Recent Political Posturing

After sixteen years in control the Democrats are still smarting from this past election. Now that Governor Daniels is beginning to fulfill his campaign pledges by shaking up the “business as usual” attitude across the State, the Democrats are utilizing every opportunity to demonize his efforts. Locally, Senator Vi Simpson was quick to the draw. With her sights clearly set on the Governors office in 2008 she took the opportunity recently to blast Governor Daniels for refusing to release millions of dollars in funding that had been promised to the State’s school systems by the previous administration. Politically speaking, it was a great opportunity to criticize the new administration for not funding education; after all, supporting education carries a very high approval rating with the voters. If you recall, it was the Democrats lead by Senator Simpson and the State Finance Committee that failed to adjust spending throughout the 2001 - 2004 recession, during which time the budget surplus disappeared faster than ozone layer. The budget surplus quickly turned into a budget deficit and guess what, the Democrats faced with a millions of dollars of red ink decided to, you guessed it, delay payments to the school systems. In 2002 they devised the scheme of making only eleven payments to the schools rather than the usual twelve, the twelfth payment was pushed into the next biennium. At the same time they gave the local school systems the ability to transfer funds from various accounts like Transportation and Capital Projects to help make up for any shortfall. Faced with the reduction in funding most schools systems simply increased their Tax Anticipation Warrant, or in other words borrowed more money. The Democrats tried to discount the notion that they were somehow cutting funding by suggesting it was simply a matter of timing. To understand this concept more clearly, try delaying one of your house or car payments and see what happens. Which brings us to today, the State is faced with a $600 million dollar deficit and wouldn’t you know it, these same elected officials still want to give money away that they don’t have. Senator Simpson recently implied that Indiana’s financial situation is not as bleak as it is being painted. Senator Simpson you can’t have it both ways, either you were wrong then or you are wrong now, which it is?

Goat Farm Developer, Like Church, Doesn't Have A Prayer

At today’s Bloomington Plan Commission meeting a draft of planning considerations meant to govern future development of the property will be discussed. In 2001 a proposal by the Church of the Good Shepherd ran into environmental issues that will surely be a roadblock for the current proposal. The property near the High Street / Winslow Road roundabout has been purchased and the developer would like to build a residential development there. However, the City Planning Department doesn’t see the current proposal fitting within their concept of the way this area should be developed. They are proposing an amendment to the Growth Policies Plan to designate this area as a “critical sub-area”. They want the development to be designed to protect wildlife habitat and safeguard the environmentally sensitive features, such as the floodplain. The developer questioned the timing and added, “The city needed to be more detailed and direct about expectations”. Why on earth would the City want to be more detailed and direct when it routinely gets away with dictating what your property rights will be? Of the three items on this evenings agenda, all three are getting negative recommendations due to environmental concerns, so what’s new? As the City gradually amends the Growth Policies Plan into it’s No Growth Policies Plan, the citizens of Monroe County will soon understand the true meaning of urban sprawl. I’m sorry, but this developer has nearly as good a chance playing tidily winks with his butt cheeks as he does getting the necessary approvals to convert this area into a housing addition.

HT Manipulated Into Character Assassination of Vic Farkas

Kurt Van der Dussen and the Herald Times once again show their lack of journalistic integrity by printing a smear story about Vic Farkas, the former County Surveyor. The article was based solely on information that was produced at a recent County Council meeting by Kevin Enright, the new County Surveyor. It is interesting how his report managed to be the only newsworthy story to come out of that meeting. Obviously character assassination plays well in Mr. Enright's circles as he attempted to destroy the credibility of his predecessor. Mr. Enright’s actions were both inappropriate and unprofessional. Unfortunately, if Mr. Enright’s past is any indication of what the future holds, we will more than likely have to endure this type of political mudslinging for the next four years. It is even more unfortunate that the HT editorial staff didn’t recognize or didn’t care that it was simply being manipulated into delivering this political propaganda to the masses. Kevin Enright was the most caustic and denigrating of all the candidates in this past election. He has personally and professionally attacked Vic Farkas on several occasions with slanderous if not libelous accusations. Vic Farkas’ spending was within his budget, a budget that he managed to reduce each year to save the taxpayers of Monroe County money while serving as the County Surveyor. The recent accusation of a “spending spree” is rather ironic since it is widely known that Mr. Enright did the same thing to Vic Farkas upon his departure four years ago only to the tune of several thousand dollars of unbudgeted and unencumbered funds. This type of petty behavior is unacceptable as an elected official and furthermore, this type of information is certainly not material for a front-page expose’.

Monday, February 07, 2005

Attitudes Fueled By Hatred

On January 31st at the Sample Gates on the IU campus two groups with opposing viewpoints about the war squared off against each other in simultaneous protest rallies. On one side there was the group calling themselves “Against the Occupation of Iraq”. The opposing viewpoint was provided by a group of College Republicans. The liberal bias that typically flows from the IU campus can sometimes be overwhelming and in this case it was obvious they didn’t like the competition. Members of the group “Against the Occupation of Iraq” were heard yelling obscenities along with other gestures of aggressive behavior. IU professor emeritus Jim Hart encouraged those in attendance to use anger and to stay angry with the statement, “The most powerful emotions we have are love and hate. We have to keep our anger and indignation white-hot”. At one point he told the College Republicans to “keep quiet, you might learn something”. What Mr. Hart and others in our community need to realize is that they too might learn something if they didn’t allow their political viewpoints to cloud their ability to keep an open mind. The basic principles of freedom allow us the opportunity to participate in social activism and we should remember these same freedoms are applied to everyone, even if they don't share our opinion. We should always be cognizant of differing opinions and respect them as we do our own. Having differing opinions is not a bad thing and certainly not on a campus where students should be challenged to think about important issues on a daily basis. It should concern every citizen of this community when individuals or groups perpetuate their attitudes or agendas with hatred and anger. Isn’t it ironic that the very people that oppose the war and protest to give peace a chance would happen to be the very same people that perpetuate local incivility against those with differing opinions? In this instance, I must admit, that I admire the College Republicans for their peaceful and civil approach to their protest and furthermore it seems Mr. Hart and his group could take a lesson from them. I wonder where our “Safe and Civil City Coordinator” was that day?

Local Democrats Show Their True Colors

In January the new Democrat controlled County Council convened for their first regular meeting of the year and they made some very concerning appointments. Their appointment of three radical environmental activists is an obvious indicator of the direction they intend to steer the County over the next few years. Michael Englert or "Moss", to those of him that know him best, illegally trespassed a couple of years ago as a tree setter in an effort to stall a local housing project on the West side, has been appointed to the Metropolitan Planning Organization. Environmental activist and I-69 opponent Bill Hayden was appointed to the County Traffic Commission. Rounding out this radical anti-growth trio was Greg Travis, County Council member Sophia Travis’ husband, with his appointment to the County’s Economic Development Commission. These appointments should concern every citizen of Monroe County as they come from the same democrats that ran on a platform of diversity in the last election. They pledged to apply diversity and all the while their appointments are coming in the form of like-minded radical “green” activists. So much for diversity!

Day One

This blog will be dedicated to provide the citizens of Bloomington and Monroe County with factual information and rational opinions about issues that affect us all. The viewpoints that will be offered will be derived from a common sense perspective and provide the reader with another source of information about local issues. Hopefully, it will be informative and thought provoking.