Go to a school voucher system and sell those monolithic schools to mall developers. The privates do a much better job at a fraction of the cost. They don’t overtax the juvy system either. Those unnecessary layers of overpriced administrators will disappear overnight. Privates get by without buses, whole staffs that do nothing but order toilet paper (some poor vice principal or office worker gets stuck doing that as part of their normal duties at the privates and probably gets stuck installing the stuff, too), and they don’t need a mini police force on site either. Those cops are then freed up to do something besides busting kids for nuisance behavior and then passing them off to an already overtaxed judicial system. Before someone jumps my case about that remark, the Star ran an article which chronicled pretty well the exhorbitant suspension rates of the schools. If these kids are that bad, you’d see them at juvy over the summer, which you don’t.

There are also NO AGENCIES at any level of government that don’t waste money. Cutting budgets is an inconvenience to them, not an impediment to providing the same crummy, expensive and usually unresponsive service we’ve become accustomed to receiving. We already know our phone calls either won’t be answered and that we’ll get the run around if they are. Now let’s have a budget that matches the quality of services received.

Oh, and let’s be sure to criminalize smoking too close to a public door and inappropriately discarding butts (usually because there is no place to put them) to raise more money. I already envision the establishment of whole new agencies at the state, county and local levels to administer these offenses. Let’s see, we’ll need officers to do the ticketing, a staff to process the tickets, a bunch of political hacks to oversee everything and waste any excess monies that may be generated, and a small judicial system to hear the challenged violations. Don’t we already have enough government devoted to enforcing laws we don’t need that end up costing more money than they ever generate for the “public good”?

Increasing fines is an excellent idea. Here’s one way we could balance the budget overnight:

Fine smokers who throw their cig butts out of car windows or on the ground. Completely obnoxious, and out of control. At $50 a pop, we could retire all city debt in a year.

As for Kevin’s question, I wasn’t aware we were subsidizing recycling. Does anyone know if that’s true? If we are we’re doing a half-assed job of it, so we should either increase the subsidy or stop it already.

The clerk and election board probably need more money because they expect more folks will start voting. That would require more money.
I’d hate to disincentivize voting.

And she’s performed excellently since that first fiasco. Best ever.

Also – could the city, on its own, eliminate setting up polls for primary elections? Let the parties spend their own %^&$%^& money on mail-in ballots. Move the school board elections and any other real election items to the fall.

And, has anybody even asked just how throwing more money at something is actually improving anything? More money for Public Safety? OK. What for and why?!! Better not be for changing uniform styles or increased traffic patrols or further subsidies of take home cars. And there better be some attention paid to the automatic raises being given via the increased costs to the City in fuel prices. And what’s up with the increases for forensics? Anybody have any data on how that is being helpful?

Plenty of questions, but nobody in charge is going to be asking them or answering them.

1. Make more cuts to the budget, except for public safety.

2. Create additional fines for minor infractions.

Here are some examples:
Parking illegally in a handicap spot – $500
Smoking right outside an intrance to a public building – $25 (Smokers can move 5 feet away from the door, so I can walk in without having to deal with their smoke.)
Fine minors or the parents if they are out past curfew – $100

I agree with Think Again. Township government needs to be abolished.

http://www.taxexemptworld.com

Their website seems to be having difficulties today (very slow) but just in Indianapolis there are over 600 pages of organizations listed, with billions in income and assets being shielded from taxation. Tens of billions!

I detest generalizations. But, too many Carmelites and Greenwooders think all that state govt. and infrastcuture is free to them. More burden is placed on Marion Co.

I once lived in Brown County. Those poor soulds cannot attract industry, and the state park there is the nation’s most-popular state park. About two-thirds of the land in that county is state or federal parks. Untaxable. They had a hell of a time raising sufficient funds for schools, county roads, etc. Because all of us love to go down and visit the beautiful parks and the tacky shops.

We’re no longer a county-only govt. region. As we grow and stratify, regional governmenmt solutions can make perfect economic sense.

Case in point: if Hancock County, for instance, needs a new jail at $40 million, why can’t they band together with one or two other counties and build a new jail on a county line, say, with Rush County or something?

We’re far too parochial with our local govt. decisions. We need to think more globally, and savings can follow.

Ergo township govt. Completely useless and without merit. Their essential functions can easily be folded into another existing layer of govt., and improved at a cheaper cost.

But we’re stepping on precious toes, huh?