"Our Charter is more specific regarding our role. Not only must we concentrate on our responsibilities as policy and lawmakers, but we are specifically charged with being budgetary watchdogs -- a check of -- and balance to -- the Executive branch of the County government. We will be able, as the definition says, to be more deliberative and thoughtful in our initiatives, proposed policy changes, system improvements and program development. No longer saddled with day to day oversight responsibilities, we should dedicate our time to delving deeper into the substantive background of the issues before us. We should be creative, innovative and now, to a new degree, objective."
So when does this start? When do they start to holding the County Executive's feet to the fire? What I have seen so far is a lack of transparency with Departments Heads not allowed to speak to the Press or Legislators until it is approved by the Executive. Department Heads not showing up to Committee meetings because then don't have the permission from the Executive to attend those meetings. The Executive was elected as stated above to run the day to day operation of the County, so lets have him focus on that. If he has time to play with seniors in the summer games that is a great feel good initiative. But let's have a well run government first.
What about a quarterly review of the budget? Where are we with sales tax revenue? How many hires have we had in the quarter? Are the departments on budget? Are there any outstanding court cases against the County and what is the exposure to the taxpayers? All questions that should be asked during a quarterly review. Ask our Comptroller to create a "Plain English" version of the budget. Remember my words, "The Taxpayers are not personal ATM machines".
We need a Fleet Manager that was debated for years, all we get now is a political appointee, what happened to hiring the best qualified person for the job? I must say the our Comptroller was heading in the right direction but he has definitely got stone walled.
The Legislators are the taxpayers only hope. Please start being fiscally responsible. Start to support our Comptroller, and work with him to audit departments for best practices and take effective measures to reduce costs. Start with departments like Social Service that represent 60%+ of our total county budget. Save some taxpayers money for heaven sakes.
As for stimulus money, before ONE DIME IS SPENT how about putting oversight in place and do the correct due diligence so we waste NO money.
We don't need task forces, what we need is need lower taxes, more jobs. Let's get this County moving in the right direction.
It is an Election year for the Legislators and the Independence party is looking forward to working with all of you, the word this year is "REFORM". I look forward to the comments we receive on this Blog.
Thank You,
Len
