The Spokane Record

Another round of spending by the United States federal government is coming up.  Our leaders seem to think borrowing money to spend in the economy is the way to go.  We are living in hard times.  More and more of us are out of work, do not have enough work to do, or are not being paid enough for our work. 

More government spending will not solve our problem.  In fact, the spending is going to make our problem worse, more intractable.  Why?  Because we cannot afford the debt service on the new spending and because we there is not money enough coming in to pay off the debt.

Our government thinks spending on its credit cards will be just fine.  But without a sure source for repayment we will have instability.  We are planting the seeds of our destruction.  We “want peace in our time” — we want immediate satisfaction.  It will not happen because a new future has to be made.  Our past cannot be recreated.  We have to pass through real economic change, a revolution of change.  Instead of this revolution of our economy, the people of the government party, want the government to take over more and more segments of our society, of our economy.  The government party seeks a “national socialism.”  The only way this brave new world will be able to sustain itself will be for government to expand into ever greater taxes on the fewer and fewer people who have real incomes.

The best approach would be to start paying the price of the creation of a real economy.  An economy where goods and services have real value.  An economy based in large part on the power of workers and investors to create real things.  An economy which is not based on illusion.

Several months ago the city Council called for a highest and best use study of the YMCA site. Well, now we have it, and here it is.

You remember the city and the county want to use conservation futures tax revenues for the purchase of the YMCA. Such taxes are to be used for only certain purposes such as the acquisition of open space so as to preserve the open space for future public park use. Regarding the YMCA the County and the city want to use the money, some $4.3 million to purchase the YMCA building which was a functioning YMCA not too long ago and which can be continued to be used for the purposes the YMCA was being used for and for other office purposes. The highest and best use study came to the conclusion that the YMCA property should be used as open space. That is that the YMCA should be torn down.

Think of it, the tax money is to be used to acquire open space but instead the tax money is going to be used to buy a building which is functioning and is going to cost some $5.3 million and then the city is going to spend an additional $830,000 to tear the building down to create open space.

If this goes through the city and County will have wasted about $6 million so as to acquire about three quarters of an acre of land in the city center. If the building is not worth $5.3 million then why would one spend so much money for. If the highest and best use is as open space then why would one not wait until such time as it would be sold as open space.

The only thing that makes sense is that elected officials are going to use public funds probably in violation of the law in order to generate money for the YMCA and in order to spend more money in order to get rid of what is they have purchased. How strange.

Mayor Verner is finally coming out with detail regarding the city budget. Her deadline for the proposed budget is a couple of weeks away. She is out speaking about the budget at various city venues. KXLY.

We have elections for three council positions but so far not one candidate has addressed the problems of the city budget. If a candidate says anything it is fluff like belief in a good budget or something about as compelling.

The mayor says she is $7 million short. She probably has to pare the budget by about 5%. There are about 2,200 city employees.

City employees get all of their health care paid for. The city insurance employee plans include medical, dental and eye care. I would estimate that for a single person without children this runs about $750 per month. For a person with, children about $1,200 per month. A person with a partner and children, one’s own and one’s stepchildren, the cost could be well in excess of $2,500 per month. Let us say the average amount per month is $1,100 per employee. That’s $13,200 per year. Given there are about 2,200 employees the city’s health care costs total $29 million per year.

I do not know how many of these employees are employed under general fund expenditures – that is the budget the mayor is talking about. Clearly, a major portion of the general fund budget could be reduced by a lowering of the health insurance benefits packages for employees.

But there is a problem with this. That would mean that the employees of the non-general fund employment units, the various utility departments, would be paid more. They would be paid more because the city has not budget constraints as to them. There are no problems regarding the budgets for the utility departments of the city – garbage, water, sewer. All the city does is to up the rates of service to meet the demand. Oh, have to tell you, the rate once upped includes what in effect is a sales tax of 25% on the amount the people pay for the services.

The mayor and council, to balance the budget of the general fund will probably up the utility tax rate to an even higher amount.

 John Roskelley, former Spokane County Commissioner, has written a good Op Ed for the Spokesman-Review concerning the so-called Spokane County Public Safety Sales Tax.  Here it is.  This is a good piece — thanks John Roskelley.

We are in tough times and the times are going to become even tougher. It is time to take stock of what government is and time to eschew notions of what this or that political wind thinks government should be. We are a government of necessary services, not a government of good things.

There is one political party today — it is Government Party. The Government Party in Spokane wants to raise taxes, ignore the core functions of government and go off on spending sprees where it spends so as to buy land and take it off the tax rolls, go in the business of car racing and drag strips, and subsidize the friends of the Government Party.

The answer to our moral dilemma is not to increase taxes, it is to take a hard look at reality and to take care of the core essentials of government with what we have. Seems to me life would be more satisfying in Spokane County if we lived our lives a bit more rigorously, more independently — we do not need a Government Party and with its faddish nostroms.

There are strong forces at work in Spokane to cause the government of the City of Spokane to become ever more involved in actions and expenditures which go beyond what local government is intended to do.  Given the current zeitgeist, the notions that government is the cause and the solution to much of our trouble, the desire to do good so as to take care of the poor, the worker, the environment, the sick, the halt —  none of what is happening is surprising.  This summer and fall the people of Spokane are going to have an opportunity to vote to take action all these fronts.  They, the voters, will, in essence, be told they can create a New Jerusalem right here in Spokane by telling the government to provide a host of rights to various deserving people and their neighborhoods.

Envision Spokane’s “Community Bill of Rights” fascinates.  It is a near perfect expression of what we have come to these days — an understanding that government is not us, is something else, maybe controlled by those who are not us, the bad guys, the rich guys, the corporations, the evil ones, and that all  that has to be done is to take control of it and tell it to do good things.

What is to become of us?  What are we becoming?

No matter what you desire, what you wish for, think government should do for you or your friends it all comes down to economics.  In the final analysis, whatever is sought, whatever electors cause their government to do in the exercise of their power over the state, the final judgment is inevitable.  It is starkly certain.  I is something which will come about no matter what.  It all comes down to economics.  Simple economics — is there enough money coming in to pay for what it is people exercising the power to control the state will cause the government to do.  The “good thing” will only be possible and provided for if there is revenue coming in to pay for the good thing.

The day of reckoning may be delayed.  Money for essential things, boring things like maintenance, keeping up a level of service, may be put off.  Funds may be borrowed from other funds, assets sold, employees paid to retire, and there may be interesting accounting gimmicks or loopholes.  In the end, however, the day of reckoning will come because if the good thing costs money money will have to come in to meet the need.

One need only to sit back and wait.  But, those who care would prefer to come up with a plan to make the good thing sustainable or if not, end it.  There is great discussion about sustainability.  The best way to get started on the   road of sustainability is to ensure understand that good things need to have funds to pay for them.  If they do not have funds then obviously the good thing is not sustainable and is a drag on the economy within which the good things are supposed to be extant.

Again, it all comes down to economics.