Local Elections

 

The municipal election champagne is heating up. The road medians and ditches are polluted with 'Vote for ME' signs and the local paper is full of ads, opinions and reports about this candidate meeting or that one.

As in all elections, there is a lot of bafflegab happening. Take the diatribe recently on Facebook by one of the incumbent counselors. There is something new in the politics of our little city, and that is an effort to elect a team of candidates instead of a full slate of so called independents. The 'Team' has been saying some things about the debt and poor management of the incumbents, and now a couple of them are striking back and calling the 'Team' liars.

What is interesting is that they are both getting their facts and figures from the same financial statements and from the same audits. Interesting how one comes up with a huge surplus and one comes up with a huge debt, all from the same columns of figures.

I will not get into how two differing opinions come from the same information, but suffice to say that the voter can be very confused about the whole thing. In the end, it comes to "who do you trust".

 

I truly hope that there is a greater interest in voting this time around. There is, what I perceive to be, a distinct opportunity to do things a little differently at the municipal level in our city. If we all do our homework and our research, and get out and vote, perhaps there will be some change. If new blood and new ideas do not pan out, we can always vote the good old boys back in next time.

 

PS: The claim by our mayor is that our home owner taxes have not increased in the last year. Maybe one of the counselors  could tell me why I am paying $400.00 more this year than last. A real smooth talker might be able to convince me that I am actually paying $400 less.