Halloween came a day late this year. On Nov. 1 the county tried to scare voters and citizens with its budget tricks.The general fund budget is about 45 percent of total county spending. The key words are cut and investment. If your salary drops from $40,000 to $38,000, that is a real cut. When bureaucrats dream about how much more they can spend next year, they call their fiscal fantasy a “budget.” When revenue is not as high as they hoped, they must trim their wish list. They call that lower rate of increase a “cut.” Nice try.When you invest money in real estate or stocks, you expect to get the money back, plus a profit. Bureaucrats invest in welfare handouts, salaries and dumb programs. We never see the money again, much less any return on it. They use such terms to pretend they are business-like, prudent stewards of your money, which they merely squander. They are the opposite of capitalists, because their goal is to implement the chief doctrine of the Communist Manifesto -redistribution of the wealth.The Declaration of Independence states the only ends of government are to secure our rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It is not to play Robin Hood to take from the rich to give to the poor. If government were limited to its original and constitutional role, taxes would be a fraction of what they are. Its only programs would be those of general and equal benefit – law enforcement, roads and little else. There would be no entitlement checks, nor services to favored individuals, nor programs to insure people against life’s experiences. We would accept individual responsibility for our lives, not collective guilt and liability for the mistakes of others.Recently, a citizen had publicly protested county zoning regulations. I urged him to sue the county for the illegal taking of his property without just compensation, as guaranteed in both our state and federal constitutions. The county attorney shouted that my role was to protect county assets. I thought my duty was to uphold the rule of law and ensure the county secured to citizens their rights to life, liberty and property.What does this have to do with budget tricks? I endured their orchestrated charade about county monetary needs, but government has no needs. Only people have needs. We hire government to fill very few of them. We have created a Frankenstein monster that has morphed from being our servant to being our master. Instead of our putting big government on an allowance, it takes what it can off the top, leaving us the residue.One department grew about 25 percent in the last three years, to $11.4 million. It adjusted its spending under 0.2 percent, or $20,000. Then the sheriff, who admitted overspending his budget, offered an adjustment of $69,000, about 0.15 percent.The prior week I had faulted the sheriff’s request for emergency service calendars that cost $10,400 for 500 copies ($20.80 per calendar), instead of simply posting the information on his Web site. That pork was defended because half the cost was from free federal funds.The sheriff then attacked me personally for my alleged impact on employee morale. Earlier that day, I had objected to county staff not providing me with requested data or returning my calls. One report had been given to Channel 5 News. My request for a copy had been ignored, as many are. Why? Because it rebutted county claims of austerity. Recent salary history of six employees showed pay increases of 96 percent to 250 percent over six or eight years. One beneficiary was the finance director, who keeps saying salaries have been frozen. Another was the wife of the $125,000-per-year- salary county administrator. She works for the sheriff. What a coincidence.The biggest budget adjustment was a 10 percent reduction in the roads budget, a service of general benefit. In 2004, voters foolishly believed a promise that a $70 million yearly tax increase for roads (the RTA) would be added spending on roads. Now, existing county road money is being stolen for other purposes.Did the Board sacrifice its tax-paid junkets to resorts? No. Did they end yearly dues of $78,000 and $170,000 paid to lobbyists? No. Did they lay off the top three administrators to save $37,000 per month? No. Over my protest, they instead opted to close county buildings to save an alleged $100,000 in utilities – under 2.5 percent of their $4.1 million of targeted savings. Why? To harm the public and to force staff to take paid vacations on short notice, which would motivate them to campaign for an upcoming tax increase. They will even close the courthouse, though all staff, except county-paid security, are state workers.To trim 0.1 percent of the general fund, they propose massive disruption and loss of vital services. One of dozens of examples of wasteful spending I have listed over the last three years could replace the $100,000. But their shutdown will create visual impacts on TV, so the county can demand a big tax increase next year. Can you now grasp why this whistleblower is reviled and shunned at work and why I wear their scorn as a badge of honor?Contact me at (719) 520-6412, by e-mail at DouglasBruce@elpasoco.com, or by writing me at 27 E. Vermijo Ave. Colorado Springs, CO 80903. Audiotapes of all BOCC meetings, both simulcast and in archives, are available at www.elpasoco.com. Comcast cable broadcasts are on Library Channel 17 at 7 p.m. Mondays and Thursdays, and repeated at 10 p.m. Back issues of my monthly reports are at www.DouglasBruce.com.i
