by Jeff Quibell
18. September 2008 01:01
Monday, Sept 15, 2008, the City Council decided to scale back the scope of work on road improvements for Woods Chapel Road by half a million dollars on the recommendation of District 1 Councilman Shaver. The council then split on approval of the overall budget and Mayor Ross broke the tie in favor of approving the budget and removing some of the funding from the planned Woods Chapel improvements.
After eighteen years of stagnation in the Woods Chapel corridor, last year the city council finally decided to move forward on Woods Chapel redevelopment. Now that the voters have solidly approved a bond issue to expand road improvements citywide including Woods Chapel, the current City Council is going back on the original commitment.
In a recent public email to the City Council, Councilman Fowler said, “The city doesn’t have a savings plan and ½ of the new cell phone revenue should go towards savings. We have way more projects than money and we save virtually nothing. With all the tax incentive programs, our cities [sic] future is mortgaged well past most of our life expectancies.”
One thing is clear to me from my tenure on the City Council. Our city staff does an excellent job in managing our tax dollars. Our budget is balanced, our emergency reserves are fully funded beyond what is recommended for a city our size, and we have reserves beyond that for anticipated future obligations. Clearly the city has a very successful savings plan. In fact over-saving in prior years is partially what created the stagnation our city experienced until recently. Policies of this type cause us to repeatedly fail to meet the needs of our citizens and help to explain why shopping and restaurant opportunities, which might have come to our city a decade ago, went west instead.
A lot of good things are happening in our city. Improved transparency in our government has helped to reconnect people with their elected officials. By televising City Council and Planning Commission meetings, our residents have the opportunity to see how our representatives discuss issues and make their decisions. The four annual City Council work session meetings should also be televised to further expand that transparency. This will give our citizens more tools to be better informed as we communicate with our elected officials and become more involved with our government. I encourage you to periodically call your Mayor and City Councilmen and help keep them informed on your views for our city.