Hey Yupette,
Want to give you a heads up. If you thought this year's Budget process was insipid, wait until next year where there will likely be two new County Board Members with children enrolled in Arlington Public Schools.Then there's Libby Garvey, who's running for re-election and won't say no to anything or anybody. The tough fiscal decisions have been made about the Pike streetcar, Artisphere, and so on. Time for more tax-borrow-spend.
So look for the two new County Board members, together with Libby Garvey and Jay Fisette, to give in to all but the most outrageous demands by APS and the for-profit and non-profit special interests. For example, look for a 50-50 revenue split between the County and APS. Look for joint decisions to be made behind closed doors by the County Board and School Board about which neighborhoods will get new Taj Mahal schools. Look for more VIP Smart Growth boosters to retire to places a hundred miles from the nearest New Urbanism.
I'm not optimistic about the independence of the County's new Independent Internal Auditor, who will have to obtain approval from a committee before he or she audits anything.
It's nice that our elected VIPs want to bring some new and different economic development here, but the sad fact is that Arlington is just too expensive a place to do business and will become more expensive.
Thanks for your blog.
Terri,
22203
