Coral Gables by iPhone: More on Merrick Park
October 30, 2009 Leave a comment
The Budget: Show Us The Results
October 29, 2009 Leave a comment
As far as I know the city commission goes through a silly exercise in which it compares last year’s proposed budget (let’s say 200-2009) with this year’s new proposed budget 2009-2010). Then at some point we get a formal accounting report on the results of the year’s spending. But (again, as far as I know) the city never publishes the 2008-2009 final spending and income results in comparison with the line items of the original approved budget. Thus the city manager and commission may have been moving monies around from one category to another, from one department to another and from one activity to another. Thus we never know where the monies may be redirected within a given budget period, and those changes are not known by the community.
Coral Gables Citizens Cannot Live by Subsidies Alone
October 29, 2009 Leave a comment
We have taken note of a number of subsidies supplied to residents and nonresidents.
Recently, we are told that the city is trying out subsidies for taxi rides of local residents (supposedly those who might need it by some standard set by the city).
We have learned in recent days that the government had been under-budgeting (doesn’t that mean “hiding) the costs of the famous trolley by about $200,000 annually. (This sounds like another Kerdyk Tax to me.)
The city is subsidizing the construction of a new museum and certainly will have to subsidize its operating costs in the future–it will not be self-financing since there do not exist self-financing museums that I am aware of.
The city subsidizes the cost of trash removal by between 30% to 50% of the costs.
We have the following questions to the city manager and commissioners:
- Let the residents see an analysis of the 2008-2009 budget with the end-of-year results laid out in the same categories and details as the budget approved at the start of 2008-2009. We get an accounting statement at the end of the year with numbers that cannot be compared with the start of the year budget and in comparable categories and items.
- We should not be subsidizing people, projects and areas without regard for the known values of the benefit impact and the true beneficiaries of the subsidies. The city cannot afford subsidies now or in the near future.
Coral Gables Watch 