St. Cloud joins the ranks of cities offering its citizens tax relief. This time, it’s real tax relief. In an amazing turn of events, the St. Cloud city council voted to rollback their mileage rate to the requested amount by the state and the city’s residents. On top of this, the city instructed the city manager to cut the budget. The city manager listed among the items that would more than likely be cut were Chamber of Commerce dues, Main Street funds as well as Cyberspot. And believe it or not, not one council or staff member talked about creating “revenue neutral” fees or fee increases to make up the loss of revenue.
We applaud City Manager Tom Hurt for his dedication to his employees. He negotiated to keep the employees raises to 1.5% and their cost-of-living adjustments to 1.5% as well. Although this wasn’t the 2% they were originally going to get, he and the council stood firm on taking care of their people. Good job!
We hope that by the time the final budget comes back, these cuts as listed are implemented and the services and employees are maintained. Congratulations St. Cloud on leading the way in our county to demonstrate effective government in the eyes of the people. We thank you!
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9 comments:
COULD YOU SEND THIS TO KISSIMMEE ELECTED OFFICIALS? MAYBE THEY CAN FIND THE COURAGE TO LEAVE MARK DURBIN'S WING AND TRY TO FLY ON THEIR OWN.
It's about time. Finally a group of politicians who get it. Well, for now anyway. If only Kissimmee could remember what is was like to be a small town that offered help to it residents as opposed to moving the tax to a new fee. Unreal! Maybe I should move to St. Cloud.
One local activist blog (KSIB) is disappointed with the tax cut and Mr. Fertic's stand with the resients against more development along a new road project. Again, showing the mentality of those who have been in government before having that mentality of defending government as opposed to the people. KSIB obviously means "Killing Society with Inflated Budgets." What's wrong with these people? Give the residents the tax cuts they've been asking for. Quit whining.
Kissimmee's elected officials do not know what they are talking about. They only know what the city manager tells them. They have not looked at the budget because they would rather threaten cutting the police and fire departments as opposed to doing their jobs.
The KSIB column will shortly be reprinted with "comments" on the other Wayne's site. Talk about "activist outsourcing!" Maybe the city will start putting video of the commission meetings on their website so he can pontificate on issues from CA without having to send away for DVDs.
Unlike the opinion of "Killing Society with Inflated Budgets" (the blog formerly known as KSIB) I heard that Tom Hurt said the police and fire positions would not be cut. I remember a certain young candidate at the St. Cloud forum saying that they could cut taxes, cut the budget and keep the staff as well as their COLAS and raises, AND they could add the police and fire personnel on the streets as well. AMAZING!!! Harrell does know what he is talking about and it looks like the politicians were listening to him. They should've elected him. He seems to be the only common sense candidate for the common man out there. Harrell for President!!!
Why is St. cloud's Council so great? They are spending $40k on two elections for someone that will have to run again in two months. So much for letting the people pick the Council person. Only 10 percent of the registered voted showed up to "pick". Make fun of that fountain all you want, but St. Cloud's waste of $40k is just as stupid.
They just have to change the law to make it mandatory to vote. If you don't vote you have to pay $100 fine. That way all the nonvoters would have to pay for the election.
There are a lot of men and women that have given there lives for our right to vote... I don't think that 40K is too much of a price to pay for the right to vote. Plus I would never leave it up to the idiots that have put us in the financial mess that we are in now to appoint another council member.
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