Friday, November 12, 2010

Economic Tolerance of our Citizens

In Government, staff always shares with the City Council best municipal practices on wages for our employees. We want to provide fair compensation and offer enough to retain good employees. Staff also points out our share of property taxes (6.5%) and how our fees, water rates, sales tax, etc compares to many other communities of size and proximity to Highland Park.

All of this is fine, but in private business, the cost of delivering your service should not be more than the revenues you can retrieve from sales in the open market. How I relate this to government is that the economic tolerance and the services provided to citizens should be regulated by the elected officials with an observance of the service delievered kept within the costs of our citizens ability to pay.

At our last meeting, I suggested we show a spreadsheet on the economic tolerance of Highland Park's citizen in respect to the combined impact of all these taxes, fees, and rates. I am not asking just about the City of Highland Park's costs, but rather total community costs and how that economic burden compares to other communities of similar size and proximity. This will help us better understand how expensive it is to live in Highland Park.

As I have stated in past writings, I am concerned that we are asking for too much and continue to ask for a greater percentage of the resources from our citizens pockets. Again, we are asking for more money from citizens than the any index of inflation has shown. Social Security Checks have not increased in 2 years, housing and stock values have declined, yet we continue to ask for more.

Enough---- We should do what it takes to roll back costs and reduce the burden on our population before more people have to leave our great community because they can't afford to live here anymore.