Thursday, April 14, 2011

County Board Caves In Response to Citizen Pressure over Budget

Hello, Yupette,

Thank you for your blog. Thanks in part to your blog the County Board caved in to citizen pressure to restore cuts in library hours, fix the Lubber Run Amphitheater, not increase the real estate tax rate, increase the number of police officers, fund homelessness prevention programs, and provide funding for several other programs that benefit County residents.

Unfortunately, the amount being budgeted to restore library cuts, renovate Lubber Run, and so on is insignificant compared to what the County Board will budget for its pet vanity projects, its pet non-profits, its funding the poverty pimps who help keep the homeless homeless, its gifts to developers and REITs, and the growth of an inefficient and wasteful County bureaucracy.

It says a lot about Arlington County Government that it's only interested in the needs of citizens when it's pressured by citizens. Time for a major change on the County Board.

Cindy

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Arlington Way 2011: Throw the Sheeple a few scraps of money for their community events and programs. But only when they loudly complain. Use the rest to fatten the fat cats, non-profits, and already-bloated bureaucracy.

Anonymous said...

First thing that's needed for fiscally responsible government is to replace the County Board. Second thing is to fire the County Manager.

Pikester said...

After the Kubicki Theater performance at the CivFed meeting the County Board of Entertainment, Recreation, and Development didn't have much choice but to keep the real estate tax rate flat and throw the sheeple some spare change.

Anonymous said...

So how many phone calls and e-mails and complaints at meetings did it take to make the County Board relent? Two thousand? Five thousand? Ten thousand?

Anonymous said...

They cut street paving funds and will use the money for vanity projects.

Ted said...

How did we reach the point where we have to beg them to spend our money in a fiscally responsible manner?

Anonymous said...

How did President Obama reach the point where he's going to throw America's children under the bus?

Anonymous said...

Oh, they're stealing the money from the bond funds we approved for street paving to fund the Artisphere, Aquasphere, Trolleysphere??

Anonymous said...

How about a post about how outrageous the County Board's Consent Agenda has become?

Dennis said...

This is no longer our County. It belongs to a bunch of cynical, manipulative, greedy, arrogant pols and their friends and associates.

Anonymous said...

"Arlington Way 2011: Throw the Sheeple a few scraps of money for their community events and programs. But only when they loudly complain. Use the rest to fatten the fat cats, non-profits, and already-bloated bureaucracy."

"First thing that's needed for fiscally responsible government is to replace the County Board. Second thing is to fire the County Manager."

"How did we reach the point where we have to beg them to spend our money in a fiscally responsible manner?"

"This is no longer our County. It belongs to a bunch of cynical, manipulative, greedy, arrogant pols and their friends and associates."

Amen and right on to all the above posters and their comments. The current Board is out of control and out of touch with the citizens of Arlington.