Looking for road, bridge, and school money? Look no further than the Shubert theater

$12 million in state bonding money to do what, complete a 10 year old revitalization of a vacant building that got moved down the street. What a waste of money. We continually hear complaints of the “elected” from Minneapolis that there is a lack of funding for bridges and roads. Maybe the money should have come from the Shubert fund! There has to be a reprioritization of funding so that the basics are covered and taxpayer's money isn’t funneled into projects that aren’t needed. I’m not against funding the arts, but the funding should come from sources other than the taxpayers.

Mayor Rybak increases taxes to pay for necessities while still spending on non-essentials

Otherwise known as having your cake and eating it too. The Minneapolis Shadow has had it up to my keyboard with the irresponsible spending habits of the Mayor and “silly council”. They think that having a lower increase is something to cheer about. My God, in this period when people are experiencing increases in just about every essential known to man, and they are cheering about increases in taxes. Time to switch to a different brand of Cool-Aid. This isn’t even the only increase “the gang” is proposing. Increase in business taxes to pay for their pet downtown projects, which will result in further driving the business climate down, is just one example. If the bikeway projects are approved they will need to come back and ask for more from the taxpayers. Increases in your state and federal taxes will be coming because of continued spending sprees driven by cities crazies such as Minneapolis. The “elected” officials such as Rybak, Ostrow, Colvin Roy, and Goodman who are cheering on these budget proposals need to be held to account for their insanity. Where are the budget cuts? There are none in Minneapolis! Only budget increase cuts! Just once, once, I’d like to hear some “elected” official say “due to the tight economy that everyone is feeling, we the elected representatives of you the people, are cutting our budgets and lowering taxes, to become good stewards of the taxpayer’s money. We will hold the line on spending, and look for ways to save the city money instead of increasing the tax burden on you the people. “ Does anyone have the “balls” to do that? I think not, because no one on the council has any!

Mayor Rybak grows city government to spend more taxpayer money

The Mayor wants to grow an already bloated government to spend taxpayer money. The Mayor wants to create a new city department that would manage the money and the projects. This is a double-edged sword, since the current NRP system has resulted in a multi-million dollar waste, fraud, and abuse scheme. The current system has allowed neighborhoods to spend the money on staff, offices, pet projects, and created a training ground for future elected officials. I’m all in favor of money being spent in neighborhoods the way the majority of the neighbors want it spent. I thought representing the needs, wants, and desires of the residents was the job of the city council members. However, creating a new city department to do this isn’t the answer either. The extra money, if it must be collected and handed out, should be done between the residents, the existing city planning department, and the council members. This plan doesn’t diminish the role of the community councils at all, and would hold generally elected city officials to account for the plans. We already have a government structure in place to create plans and handout money, USE IT!

The War on Partisanship

We have had many wars; some militarily and some figuratively. We have had the War On Poverty, the War on Drugs, but where is the War on Partisanship? One of the biggest underlying problems with our political system today is the deepening divide between the political ideologies. Political discourse is the critical foundation of our Republic, however we have lost our ability to focus on solving the issues instead of the rhetoric. Many of my friends are steeped into the political process in one form or fashion in one party or the other. God love them for their beliefs and hard fought stances on issues. The problem is that too much of our policy-making has been compromised by money and pay back issues. Common sense and the good of the people has been replaced by political gamesmanship and partisan “got you one upsmanship”. These games are played on all levels of government.
On the national scene you see that America can’t produce the energy needed to fill the needs of its people. This is due to the silly notion that the oil companies can’t be responsible stewards of the environment.
On the state scene you see that Minnesota can’t provide much needed work on bridges and roads because the funding is misused or political games are being played out by oversized children (see article in the StarTribune http://www.startribune.com/politics/state/26818829.html?page=1&c=y).
On the local city scene you have the one party fiefdom that continually treats Minneapolis like a game of SimCity with the money cheat entered as many times as needed to fulfill it’s ever-loving need for spending.
For the very good of the county, state, and city; Stop the insanity and get to the real work of addressing real problems before we the people declare war on you!

Newsflash: Minneapolis has plenty of money to support its essentials

The city council members and mayor must have looked in the correct cookie jar because they have found $41 million dollars to spend on something that isn’t a necessity. I guess they now can afford more cops, to pay for their own park improvements and bike paths, can buy back their movie rental libraries, and can lower taxes. The project to change the traffic patterns on Marquette and second avenues, add art and landscaping, widen sidewalks, and change bus lines will cost $41 million dollars in a city that the officials claim they always need more money to fund their responsibilities. Next time the ‘silly council” and mayor claim they need more money from you, better hold on to your wallets and tell them to take a flying leap down Marquette avenue.

Learning where to set priorities and work within our system

The city council has historically spent unprecedented amounts of taxpayers’ dollars on pet projects and bad brokered deals to the point they have successfully legalize unlawful use of the public money. This problem is rooted in a general mindset of most of the elected officials in this town that the taxpayers’ money is an unlimited pot to dip in for all their high ideals rather than look upon the money as a public TRUST. We as the owners of the government have a responsibility to pay for it, however the “elected” have the responsibility to spend the funds wisely. Most of the blame for this occurring falls on the majority of the general public for allowing it to occur. Shame on you voters for not being informed and educated enough to see what you are electing for what they really are, thieves.
The city council members, like Paul Ostrow, whine about situations like the one they are currently facing with the federal government not fully reimbursing the city for all of the costs related to the bridge collapse as they had requested. It will be interesting to hear the results from the hearings on this matter, and the reasons the full requested amount isn’t being reimbursed. Given the city’s habit of asking for more than it needs, spending control issues, and general lack of respect for the taxpayers; I would expect that the findings would fall into one of those categories. Instead of sucking it up and cutting back on spending they will either; fight it out until they get what they want or run into a brick wall, raise our taxes to cover the expense, or try to steal it from somewhere else. Here again, we the citizens get the government we ask for. We keep electing these people and promoting them to higher office. For example, Diane Loeffler gets elected to the state house of representatives after working in the financial office of the city of Minneapolis, which is riddled with financial problems costing the taxpayers millions. Way to elect someone we can trust with the state coffers! We have elected officials and citizens running around singing the praises of the James Oberstar (not even elected from Minneapolis) who is promising to use Federal Highway funds to build bike paths in Minneapolis. Do you think maybe we should use, or should have used, that money for bridge repair, inspection, and reconstruction? Does anyone think along these lines? NO! They want it both ways. This type of government mentally may work in other countries with other forms of government, but not here in the USA. Our government, regardless of party, have gotten away from basic principles that work for the way our government is setup. Like in football you need to play to your strengths. The strengths of this country is our freedom to pursue our personal goals, an economic system that allows for the feeding the basic human desire to achieve, and a government serves the people not the other way around. The government is setup to service the citizens for which they can’t do for themselves, and the government ceases to function properly when working outside of that charge. Clearly our government at all levels has gone beyond that charge and no longer functions properly. We the citizens need to recognize that fact and make the proper corrections.

Minneapolis budget busting Swamp Water…Yum Yum Give me some

Minneapolis has budgeted $200,000 to promote the swamp water that comes out of our tap. Pure propaganda. Not only that but the “rain tax”, otherwise known as the water runoff fee that you are forced to pay on your water bill, supposedly goes towards the sewer system in order to help keep a clean water supply. The water out of our tap smells bad, tastes bad, and is scary to look at. The only way to combat this is to buy a house filtration system, but I thought we didn’t need to do that because of all the extra money “mama Minneapolis” collects to freshen our water for us. Guess I was wrong to trust “mama Minneapolis”.
BTW, how many cops can you buy with $200,000?

The Mayor has the idea to build water fountains that cost $50,000 each, OMG (that’s “oh my gosh” for you non texting folks like me out there). He wants to have big gushing water fountains like the ones he remembers from years ago as a little mayor. Every time the Mayor gets to feeling nostalgic for the “good old days” we the tax payers get a bit liter in the pocket books. Remember he also thinks back to Hennepin avenue in downtown being a two way, wants to build Washington avenue into the Champs Elysees of Midwest, and he is fond of trolley cars. Maybe Mayor Rybak is more suited for paying the video game Sim City than the seriousness it takes to run the real thing. At least with the game you can enter a cheat code when you need more money to plant your dreams instead of fiscally raping the citzens.