| Author |
Message |
    
John Caffrey
Citizen
Username: Jerseyjack
Post Number: 411
Registered: 11-2005
| | Posted on Saturday, July 29, 2006 - 1:40 pm: | 
|
So the Gov. wants to reduce taxes. The best way to start is to reduce spending.
Lets begin with county governments. Why are they needed. Eliminate them and pass the responsibility to the state or at least a regional entity. Working employees would be hired by the state to run the parks, park police, highway repair, etc. At the very least, we would save freeloader salaries, benefits and pensions.
County governments began at a time when communication was slow and it was believed that local people would know the problems of and solutions to local affairs. This is no longer the case. County governments are an anacronism.
At the least, merge the counties. There would be fewer politicians to bribe and the contractors would also save money which they can use to submit lower bids.
County Superindentent of Education: Does anyone know what this person and staff does? Has anyone ever met the person? -- Again, salary, benefits, building expenses.
Board of Ed. elections - Why do we have the cost of separate elections? Consolidate this election with other elections and save the cost of poll workers and moving equipment.
Lets have Community Affairs oversight on municipal spending. Since municipalities are "creations" of the state, the state has ultimate authority over the municipality. Lets stop wasteful spending such as the Devil's Arena and the S.O. sculpture. It could be arranged so that if a percentage of citizens submit a challange to the Department of Community Affairs about a municipal expenditure, the department could research it and approve or disapprove it.
Anyone else have any other ideas?
|
John Caffrey
Citizen
Username: Jerseyjack
Post Number: 415
Registered: 11-2005
| | Posted on Sunday, July 30, 2006 - 12:12 pm: |
|
Ain't noone else got any? |
SO Ref
Citizen
Username: So_refugee
Post Number: 2027
Registered: 2-2005
| | Posted on Sunday, July 30, 2006 - 12:26 pm: |
|
You'll never see a consolidation of elections as local entities don't actually want people to come out to vote. It works out better for them to have 1,000 of their friends voting instead of 10,000 people who just happen to be in the booth voting for state or national offices.
I'm originally from the South, where the counties held greater power over smaller municipalites in terms of county police, fire, and BOE. Was it better? Debatable - police/fire = yes; schools = no. Was it cheaper? Hell, yes. My taxes were 1/10 of what I currently fork out. |
tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 5374
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Sunday, July 30, 2006 - 12:31 pm: |
|
I wonder if county-level government isn't the problem, but the solution.
We're not in a position to have that as an option right now, but imagine if we did not share a county with Newark, Irvington and a few others. The possibilities for shared services run at a county level -- a county that was responsive to the needs of communities like ours -- would be enormous. A "West Essex" authority could trim a lot of administrative costs and more efficiently allocate services for police, fire, trash removal, parks and recreation, maybe even schools.
Whatever special costs we (meaning Essex County residents) are bearing right now to prop up the waste in those communities could migrate up to the state level, where they'd be shared by a broader taxpayer base. |
notehead
Supporter
Username: Notehead
Post Number: 3645
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Sunday, July 30, 2006 - 1:44 pm: |
|
Governments at every level have been terribly lax about implementing energy conservation measures which, by definition, save money on an ongoing basis. They're not doing a fraction of what could be done, within reasonable spending limits. (I don't know about Maplewood, but it seems that South Orange hasn't given it a second's thought.) Imagine if the federal government required all of it's buildings -- whenever it's realistically achievable -- to be designed and constructed with roofs covered with solar panels, oriented to achieve maximum solar exposure. That one move, all by itself, would cause the price of solar energy to plummet, and solar systems already produce two to five times (or more) more value in terms of energy than they cost to install. In other words: free money. |
Scully
Citizen
Username: Scully
Post Number: 848
Registered: 8-2005
| | Posted on Monday, July 31, 2006 - 9:25 am: |
|
I agree with eliminating county government, an opinion I've held for years.
We have municipal, state and federal government already, surely they can absorb what the counties do instead of having 4 layers. |
Gordon Agress
Citizen
Username: Odd
Post Number: 482
Registered: 8-2004
| | Posted on Monday, July 31, 2006 - 9:29 am: |
|
Yesterday's Star Ledger had an article on the $350mm in pork in the latest budget. The Governor's position was 1) one problem here is that the division is too one-sided to the party in power; 70-30 would be better 2) another is all of this just emerged as a surprise at the end; 3) the Congressional earmark process is the transparency model that we should be aiming for. Nothing about the inherent unfairness of doling out tax money purely on legislative leverage, nothing about the size and growth rate of this, nothing about whether the state government should be doing any of this stuff in the first place. Business as usual, with some modest tinkering.
It was not an encouraging article.
|
themp
Supporter
Username: Themp
Post Number: 3122
Registered: 12-2001
| | Posted on Monday, July 31, 2006 - 10:39 am: |
|
Isn't it true that NJ pays a smaller percentage of education costs on the state level and a higher percentage on the county level when compared to other states? Hence the high property tax burden (plus the corruption). We need to raise statewide revenue if we want to reduce property tax. Gas tax, sin tax, higher state income tax? Beats me. |
argon_smythe
Citizen
Username: Argon_smythe
Post Number: 876
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Tuesday, August 1, 2006 - 12:36 am: |
|
Well, what we're doing at work is shipping all our jobs over to India. Could Motor Vehicle Services be run out of Mumbai? Dept of Taxation out of Bangalore? Maybe there's qualified case workers for the Child Welfare Dept in the disputed territory of Kashmir.
|
John Caffrey
Citizen
Username: Jerseyjack
Post Number: 421
Registered: 11-2005
| | Posted on Tuesday, August 1, 2006 - 9:35 am: |
|
Notehead -- regarding conservation. Geo-theremal had a payback of 10 years when the cost of oil was $1.80 per galllon. Now, with higher fuel costs, the payaback should be quicker.
The state is/was subsidizing the cost of geo-therm. Given the size of municipal and county government buildings, geo-therm deserves a look. |
|
Closed: New threads not accepted on this page