Denver's Money Woes...
The past few years here in Denver we've seen the city cut funding to schools, services to low-income families, lower level city employees and employee benefits, the Police and Fire Departments, the Department of Transportation, and a host of other programs designed to help us and our families live and prosper in Colorado.
These cuts in funding are the result of financial shortages caused by natural disasters, greedy politicians, bad finacial managing, stupid lawsuites, war, and the financial lashback caused by the terrorist attacks of September 11th, 2001.
The Governor of Colorado, Bill Owens, and the mayors of the various cities within the Denver Metro Area including the City and County of Denver, Lakewood, Thornton, Westminster, Golden, Wheatridge, Arvada, and Aurora have tried various methods of reducing their city's financial strain by implementing cuts that hurts the people that they are sworn to represent. These knee-jerk reactions have had very little financial benefits, all short-term, while giving birth to a whole new generation of problems that will have severe financial repercussions in the near future.
Cutting power to street lights in suburban areas and cutting the snowplow services in side streets does save some money for the city but creates a dangerous environement that will cause traffic accidents which will result in the loss of life and limb and end up costing the city thousands of dollars in lawsuites. This is a plan that the city of Lakewood is implementing.
The City of Denver reached an agreement with the Fire Department's Union cutting their pay raises, benefits, promotions, and new hires for the next few years. The Denver Police Department refused those cuts but is unable to get the funding to hire new officers, something that they desperately need to do.
Meanwhile, fines for overdue library books, the cost of public transportation, heating bills, and taxes have all increased in order to offset our cities financial burden.
One thing that Governor Owns and the horde of various Mayors fail to understand is that knee-jerk reactions almost never work. Making life harder for the people who live in the city is a program doomed to failure as these same people will either move to another city that is less financially strapped or will be forced to seek financial assistance from the city. Either way, the city suffers. How does that solve anything?
What Colorado and the various cities in the Denver Metro Region need to do is to take some fiscal responsibility and fix our city's budget. Instead of cutting funding to the Police and Fire Departments, cut the Governor's yearly income in half. Instead of raising taxes, increase the minimum fines for crimes like DUIs, DWUIs, Assualt, Domestic Violence, Speeding, Reckless Driving, Impersonating an Officer, Cruelty to Animals, Child Abuse, Spousal Abuse, and Hate Crimes. Make the people who break the law and endanger other people pay for the rest of us to have a safer environement.
Why not take it a step further? Instead of sitting in jail and getting free room and board along with perks like a fitness center and cable television, why don't we make criminals work off their debt. If we had convicts doing construction along I-25 under the supervision of the Sheriff Department and the Department of Transportation than not only would they be learning a trade skill that they could use after they are free, they are also saving the city and state of Colorado millions of dolloars of money spent in manpower.
Imagine if a person were drinking and driving. They get pulled over and receive a ticket. They are found guilty at their trial and have a three thousand dollar fine imposed on them. They are given thirty days to pay the fine, assuming that they don't get caught drinking and driving again, and can't do it. They are convicted and sent to hard manual labor that pays five dollars an hour. By the time they have paid the rest of their debt, they will have been completely dry for a month or more!
Take away all the perks that people in prison and jail receive. Provide them with decent shelter, a mat to sleep on, food and water. A phone to call their lawyer. Some time outside for health reasons. Books. That's it. No tv, no gym, no socializing. Nothing. Make the prisons and jails a place to avoid instead of a rough vacation.
Fines and punishments would be carefully monitored for abuse and situational circumstances. They would also only be for crimes that already have a negative effect on their job, their families, or are a danger to other people.
We can merge departments within the city. Instead of the Denver Police and the Denver Sheriff's Department being seperate entities with seperate departments overseeing them, we can have them overseen by one department, one that could also oversee the Fire Department and other departments that serve a similar function, thus saving on the money spent on upper management.
Why not have one person responsible for the city's budgeting and compose quarterly audits with that person accountable for the city's spending? Give that City Accountant veto power over spending programs so that they can be held accountable. Add in some serious legal repercussions for someone who falls short of the quarterly accounting or abuses the veto power. That way departments cannot overspend and the Accountant cannot shift blame to someone else and becomes lagaaly liable for fiscal errors.
Bring back banned entertainments like the Ultimate Fighting Championship which brought in almost a BILLION dollars in three short years before Denver asked them to leave for "moral" reasons. Whose morals? Who gets to decide crap like that anyways?
These are just a few simple yet effective ways to save money while still providing needed services to the people in the city. God I wish I were in charge!
These cuts in funding are the result of financial shortages caused by natural disasters, greedy politicians, bad finacial managing, stupid lawsuites, war, and the financial lashback caused by the terrorist attacks of September 11th, 2001.
The Governor of Colorado, Bill Owens, and the mayors of the various cities within the Denver Metro Area including the City and County of Denver, Lakewood, Thornton, Westminster, Golden, Wheatridge, Arvada, and Aurora have tried various methods of reducing their city's financial strain by implementing cuts that hurts the people that they are sworn to represent. These knee-jerk reactions have had very little financial benefits, all short-term, while giving birth to a whole new generation of problems that will have severe financial repercussions in the near future.
Cutting power to street lights in suburban areas and cutting the snowplow services in side streets does save some money for the city but creates a dangerous environement that will cause traffic accidents which will result in the loss of life and limb and end up costing the city thousands of dollars in lawsuites. This is a plan that the city of Lakewood is implementing.
The City of Denver reached an agreement with the Fire Department's Union cutting their pay raises, benefits, promotions, and new hires for the next few years. The Denver Police Department refused those cuts but is unable to get the funding to hire new officers, something that they desperately need to do.
Meanwhile, fines for overdue library books, the cost of public transportation, heating bills, and taxes have all increased in order to offset our cities financial burden.
One thing that Governor Owns and the horde of various Mayors fail to understand is that knee-jerk reactions almost never work. Making life harder for the people who live in the city is a program doomed to failure as these same people will either move to another city that is less financially strapped or will be forced to seek financial assistance from the city. Either way, the city suffers. How does that solve anything?
What Colorado and the various cities in the Denver Metro Region need to do is to take some fiscal responsibility and fix our city's budget. Instead of cutting funding to the Police and Fire Departments, cut the Governor's yearly income in half. Instead of raising taxes, increase the minimum fines for crimes like DUIs, DWUIs, Assualt, Domestic Violence, Speeding, Reckless Driving, Impersonating an Officer, Cruelty to Animals, Child Abuse, Spousal Abuse, and Hate Crimes. Make the people who break the law and endanger other people pay for the rest of us to have a safer environement.
Why not take it a step further? Instead of sitting in jail and getting free room and board along with perks like a fitness center and cable television, why don't we make criminals work off their debt. If we had convicts doing construction along I-25 under the supervision of the Sheriff Department and the Department of Transportation than not only would they be learning a trade skill that they could use after they are free, they are also saving the city and state of Colorado millions of dolloars of money spent in manpower.
Imagine if a person were drinking and driving. They get pulled over and receive a ticket. They are found guilty at their trial and have a three thousand dollar fine imposed on them. They are given thirty days to pay the fine, assuming that they don't get caught drinking and driving again, and can't do it. They are convicted and sent to hard manual labor that pays five dollars an hour. By the time they have paid the rest of their debt, they will have been completely dry for a month or more!
Take away all the perks that people in prison and jail receive. Provide them with decent shelter, a mat to sleep on, food and water. A phone to call their lawyer. Some time outside for health reasons. Books. That's it. No tv, no gym, no socializing. Nothing. Make the prisons and jails a place to avoid instead of a rough vacation.
Fines and punishments would be carefully monitored for abuse and situational circumstances. They would also only be for crimes that already have a negative effect on their job, their families, or are a danger to other people.
We can merge departments within the city. Instead of the Denver Police and the Denver Sheriff's Department being seperate entities with seperate departments overseeing them, we can have them overseen by one department, one that could also oversee the Fire Department and other departments that serve a similar function, thus saving on the money spent on upper management.
Why not have one person responsible for the city's budgeting and compose quarterly audits with that person accountable for the city's spending? Give that City Accountant veto power over spending programs so that they can be held accountable. Add in some serious legal repercussions for someone who falls short of the quarterly accounting or abuses the veto power. That way departments cannot overspend and the Accountant cannot shift blame to someone else and becomes lagaaly liable for fiscal errors.
Bring back banned entertainments like the Ultimate Fighting Championship which brought in almost a BILLION dollars in three short years before Denver asked them to leave for "moral" reasons. Whose morals? Who gets to decide crap like that anyways?
These are just a few simple yet effective ways to save money while still providing needed services to the people in the city. God I wish I were in charge!
posted by Keko at 11:58
2 Comments:
I appriciate that you actually gave examples of how you would find money in other places. It seems that in most cases people either cry that the government is taking too much money from them in taxes, or not doing enough to help them. Usually it's both. Unfortunately the way that money works, is you can't have lots of government bennifits (like good roads, social services, fire departments, etc) without giving the government the money to do so.
I personally don't know what the budgeting situation is in most cities. I have failed as a citizen for not knowing this, or really caring enough to find out. Most people are satisfied with complaining and giving the excuse that they are powerless to fix things. Of course we know that we aren't powerless, but we are too lazy as a society to do anything about it.
Some of the population wants the government to take care of lots of things for them, provide day care, provide good roads, good police departments, schools, etc. Another part of the population feels that government is just going to screw that up and are more in favor of lower taxes and then them making the choices themselves. This leads to toll roads, vouchers for private schools, etc.
I personally hate toll roads, but am not sure how I feel yet about a lot of the other issues. I think that people rely too much on the public school system, and are expecting it to essentially raise their children, but heaven forbid if they try to instil morals (I'm not talking religion) or disapline or other "good parenting things" because "hey I'm the parent! you have no right to do that!" If that's true, than act like the parent. Pay attention to what your kid is learning in school, make them do their homework, participate in parents groups, etc. Don't rely on the public schools to babysit your kids from 6am until 9pm.
Personally I think that it is because of lot of these types of afterschool programs, and because of the added strain on teachers from this philosphy that our schools are underfunded. We have provided at least 2 new tax increases for schools each of the last 4 years or more. Where the heck is it all going?!
Ok, now I'm ranting...lol Just something to think about. Which side of this line do you fall on, and for how much of it?
Dawn
I'm part of the population that believes that the government is responsible for providing good schools, good roads, police, and more. That is their obligation and job. That is the reason for having a government in the first place.
I agree that parents are relying on other people to raise their kids. I think that the practice is stupid and we can already see the results everyday by turning on TV, going to the mall, or by visiting our children's schools. I have seen children less than ten yours old, single digits people!, cuss out their parents. I have seen parents cave in to their children's demands, and "demand" is the correct word, they don't know how to ask for anything.
The show Nanny 911 and its various knock-offs aren't showcasing abnormal families. These are the normal families and households of today. It's sick and wrong in a deep soul-wrenching way.
A lot of school money is wasted. Most of this is due to government and school-board screw-ups. Some of it is because of the teachers' union and stupid parents. Some of it is because popular programs like sports are given more money than unpopular programs like art class. But some of it is because we the parents aren't holding anyone responsible for the way that the money is used.
It takes more than one or two concerned parents to make the people in charge accountable for their actions. It takes a united effort by the majority of the parents in order to do this. And as long as we have stupid selfish lazy so-called "parents", that's never gonna happen. 'Cause these jerks will never be motivated to care enough about their children to do anything.
I'm allowed to rant, I named this blog appropriately...
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