What would you cut on the city/county level?

Things are so upside down these days. Our government seems to be making all the wrong cuts and spending in all the wrong places, so I thought we could come together and think of things that would be sensible to cut.

Just like the story about the airline who saved many thousands of dollars simply by removing one olive from the salads they served. Of course, this was when airlines fed you.

To get things started, we need to start on the city and/or county level. Plus, this would help get some common sense trickling to the top.

So, I'll start.

Mosquito spray trucks need to go.
They're costly to fuel and maintain. Plus, I don't think they lower the mosquito population and I don't want to be breathing in their pesticide mist!

What's your suggestion?
Try to stick to one - if you can.

Get rid of City and county gov's.

That will save a little.

Public Schools,public parks welfare food stamps wars social security,the war on drugs,and everything else besides the criminal court system

Land usage restrictions ended so that properties could be multi family or used as eco farms. Restrictions of running home businesses from your property. Builidng materials and allowing recycling and eco homes such as earthship homes, cob homes, tiny homes, homemade paper crete homes. Restrictions for grass, and shrubs instead gardens and clothes lines. No restrictions on gardening or use of outdoor clothes drying. All corporate laws repealed, only common law is valid, thou shalt murder or rape or steal kind of thing.

Setting up land usage for homeless, gardens and yurts/recyled homes, earthships for the homeless.

Property taxes being a sliding scale based on income and not being owed for those with less than the poverty line for their family size.

Many many other similar laws.

I have a more generic suggestion:

Everybody has had to cover for somebody that was absent, at one time or another. Pick 1 person, from each department, at every level, that is easiest covered for when absent, and take them off the payroll.

The politicians salaries. 70% of Minnesota's politicians are still being paid while the govt is shutdown. wtf!

Cut the pay of the mayor, city counsel and police dept. by 25 %
and downsize the numbers of offices necessary to do their business.

All state paid smoozing meetings do not need to be catered...want food, bring your
own...want to use golf as an excuse for a meeting...pay your own greens fees only...
Everybody else can pay for theirs.

Don't need "crotch" rocket motorcycles for the barnyard...pigs can always ride a bike...
or better yet...let 'em walk...would do 'em good to get to know who employes them.

You said just one...sorry...I could think of sooo many more.

I have worked for the city and county of denver and another metrpolotin city and can honestly say, wasted money doesnt even begin to explain it! I have witnessed 1st hand the disgusting money wasting. However , the reason why it is like this is because nobody wants to work themselves out of a job. To truly save money the city needs to contract this roadwork and other projects out to private sector. imo

Seeing as how I live where it snows, I'd get rid of the snowplows. So what if people can't get to work... It'll (likely) still be there when the roads become passable again.

The costs are numerous: the plow itself, drivers, managers, gas, insurance, chemicals, sand, and road damage repair...

I don't believe that anything needs to be cut that helps the little guy right now. That's just a bad idea.

I do agree that our politicians' salaries should be cut. If Obama had threatened to reduce their pay instead of threatening to withhold SS checks, he'd probably have made more headway.

I'm all for reducing government, but you can't get rid of it all at once. That's just not feasible.

I would like to see our governor's mansions sold to recoup money. No where does it say that public servants should live in such extravagance.

reply to post by Afterthought


Dear Afterthought,

You cannot begin to understand what to cut if you do not understand the financing. Cities and counties are financed in part by the Federal Government and in part by state governments. If you cut the jobs that are funded by the state or fed, you have not reduced your city or county costs by one cent. We can ask at another time what the fed and states should be paying local governments to do. Your number one cost is police and fire in local government.

If you reign in your police and fire departments, rather than ignore how they spend money, then you will have more than enough money for other services. Start with your police departments, look at the payouts for law suits. Look at the amount of overtime, look at how they are used to raise revenue rather than stop crime. Then ask how much safer you are as they increase the number of police. I am the son of a deceased law enforcement person and he was a good one. He told me where to look. Be well.

County commisioner positions.
My county has more county commisioners than sheriff's deputies on the streets. makes no sense

peace

reply to post by AQuestion


I agree with you and understand that the money comes from the top. I just wish that the receivers of the money knew how to spend it smartly.

For example, when I heard that the Camden, NJ police department was being cut by 1/3, I was horrified. THat's one of the most crime ridden cities in the US and they decide to cut the police force? Stuff just doesn't seem right. Not at all. Salaries need to be cut. Unnecessary services need to be gone. Liek I mentioned with the mosquito trucks. I'm smart enough, and my neighbor is too, to not leave standing water around as breeding pools. Has anyone ever heard about whether or not the chemicals/pesticides they spray are composed of anyway? It might be a watered down version of Agent Orange for all we know, but I'm getting off topic.

Thanks for everyone's comments!

I would cut the pay to all city state workers down to the federal minimum wage.
This would separate the sheep from the goats in short order.
For the longest time people 'voulenteered' to do what was needed.
Not for the money, but because they had a sense of civic duty.
Guess what... It worked.

As a general rule SWAT teams are not required at the city/county level
Most schools and school boards are top heavy - gut the admin.
Most schools now have to many assistant principles - don't need-em
Repeal all unfunded federal mandates forced upon cities and counties period! this will help with the preceding cuts.
Privatize services as much as possible based on common accepted commercial contract format, not the crap Government has which perpetuates cronyism.
Can the unions, unions do not belong in Government by the people, for the people. Most City and County obligations due to sweetheart pension and health systems are driving local Government towards bankruptcy.

Honestly the best way for cuts to be effective is to have the budgets done by independent people who are immune to bribes, or serving their own self interests. Here's a good suggestion.

Have one city evaluate and set the budget for a different city and vice versa. La county supervisors would take another county somewhere in the country and be given all the relevant information and anonomously set their budget for them while someone else set's La county's budget.

This way people would be more likely to do the serious business without fear of losing their seat while blaming any possible hard to take decisions on someone else. But the needed cuts would be done and people would have to live with it.

...make it illegal (with a hefty fine) for businesses to hire "paper hangers" that trash up my front door with advertisements... its bad enough that 90% of my mail is junk but at least it is contained and out of view...

...that would also apply to the local newspaper that gets thrown into my front yard once a week... if i ever want to read the local rag, i'll go buy it (but thats never gonna happen cuz its all junk, lol)......

...would that save my town/county money?... yep... the wind rarely stops blowing here and the people hired to clean up blown trash dont work for free...

Nice shiny cop cars and fire trucks.......They all have the newest up to date equipment......They do not need to use trash, but a 15 year old fire engine can still perform it's duties........They wash the dang things every time they leave the station. even if there is no fire.

I also think that if there are four guys standing around a hole with one shovel and one wheelbarrow, they need two more shovels, or two less guys....Production could be picked up a hair...Which saves money.....

I could go on and on. But I need a smoke.

Have a good one all.

reply to post by Afterthought


Dear Afterthought,

I have been involved in municipal finance for decades and can assure you that people know where the money comes from and how it should be spent. The problem is that politicians and the public just see it as money and want to spend on whatever they want.

I highly recommend that people investigate the GFOA (the governmental finance officers association - or something like that). If people do then they will discover that there is not government pension problem (yep, it is a lie), they will also discover how government is financed. Another place to look is the Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB).

Police and Fire are primarily "General funded", this means that it uses all of the discretionary funds, the money that the City or county does not have to justify spending. Look nationwide at how many local governments cut services and reduced the pay to civil servants while giving their police pay raises. Kinda scary. If your politicians are crooks then the police know it, why do they not put more of the politicians in jail, it is because they get generous retirements and pay raises. The upstanding officers that wish to arrest the politicians are moved to other duties.

Whatever local government you live within, go online and look at their budget, look at where your money goes. Someone on this thread said that they should contract out road repair, lol. That showed a lack of understanding of funding or need. Contracting out to the monopoly that is asphalt is suicide and the fact is that most municipalities do just that and that is why the roads are the way they are. Contracting out 10% of your budget and giving increases to 50% of your budget (police and fire) means you save nothing. You want to see something interesting, as municipal funding has decreased, fires have increased. Hmmm. Fear tactics to keep a special class of government employees, special. The politicians focus on police and fire because it gets them votes, scare tactics.

Please allow me to explain the political game. The politicians cut road repair first and then libraries, they don't cut the waste, nope road repair and libraries, nationwide this is true. They keep police and fire and all the silly programs that the local government are redundant in. That is to justify tax increases while claiming that safety is first. It is a scam to get you to accept more taxes.

1. Release drug users from city/county jails, and stop prosecuting them. A city can reduce its police force by about 10% that way.

2. Have someone in charge willing to make cuts based on factual data only. They're handed a sheet of paper that has the largest numbers on it (expenditures). They cut into the first 5 by 20%, period. They have no idea what they are, just that they are the largest expenditures. That way emotion and self-interest are removed from the equation.

Someone willing to just rip the damned band-aid off is what is needed in any economic slump.

/TOA