Starving government = inefficient government.

[Baitball Blogger]

Not sure why we haven't been able to tie into this more effectively. While Repub local governments are commending themselves because their budgets are allowing a tax savings back to the citizens, the real question is, what is government getting away with to justify that return? If you look closely, the answer could be something that gives them an excuse to hide a great deal of incompetence.

In my situation, the local government is in terrible need of upgrading its computer department with updated software, and maybe even hire programmers who can fix software programs in a timely period. In Florida, the rules are very stringent about Public Records keeping and, unless something drastically changed, my government allows employees and officials to delete emails before the department makes a Master backup! They make searches so difficult to make that you have to put a chunk of change down as a deposit before they even begin to start looking! Isn't that the whole point of getting a computer system? Easy searches?

And, of course, there's the fact that the city gave up maintaining a fire department and handed the budget bleeder to the county. It's like a sinking ship, unloading anything that has to do with government oversight.

So here we have something to look for. What are the Repubs giving up in efficiency in order to justify the return of those taxes? Rick Scott already has a dozy to answer for with the TB cases in Jacksonville. I say we keep drilling the cause and effect pattern until the point is made.

[HiPointDem]

1. what it also means is local governments have fewer resources to resist exploitation from outside

& are more likely to bow to the desires of corporations and resource grabbers, both national and global.

my thoughts after reading an article about a local government telling citizens there's "nothing they can do" about a corporation fracking around their town.

local government is practically the only venue left where ordinary people can actually directly impact decisions that matter for their lives.

the locusts are stripping that too.

[Baitball Blogger]

3. I don't know the layout of your local community,

but, in my community, when the local goverrnment signs up to an economic development decision they go looking for allies. Generally that means finding the most vocal opponents. In my city that meant the Rotary Club and a HOA which had no mandatory authority over the area, but it was a political arm.

Once the city silences the political arm or owns it through a legal mess that turns it into a co-defendant in a large settlement, there's nothing to stop the city or their crooked lawyers, from giving legal opinions that won't tell you the whole truth about the situation.

[randr]

2. As government fails to meet its obligations the Republican plan

is to replace all "social" programs and institutions with "private" sector industry.
"Big Brother" is corporate America.

[Baitball Blogger]

4. Because their plan is all on paper,

we need to take advantage of the crisis and episodes that show the flaw in their plan: i.e. TB in Jacksonville.