This is a follow up post by Anthony Watts that is in the comments section on “Suckers or Sellouts”. This was so good I didn’t want you to miss it. So here you go:
by Anthony Watts
Well if you look at the looming budget deficit for the City of Chico, its not likely there will be much funding available to pull any of this Global Warming initiative off anyway.
The City has started spending more than it takes in with tax revenue. Take the City Park Plaza overrun for example. For the whole City budget, there is a 1.5 million deficit for the budget year 2006/2007, and if revenue projections hold, that deficit may balloon over the next ten years for a net loss of 40-50 million.
Regardless of whether you think this Global Warming initiative idea is a good one or not, the one immutable fact is that deficit spending in local government eventually creates a day of reckoning.
Living beyond your means to fund dreams, eventually causes nightmares, no matter what side of the political bed you wake up on.
We should elect people that get their financial house in order first. Lets hope that whomever gets elected on November 7th doesn’t resort to creating new taxes as a way to correct past financial mistakes.