Government must live within means

Here we go again. The intellectual elite, this time in the form of Everett banker Mike Deller, blame the loss of their pet project’s funding by rationalizing, “I really don’t know if the community fully understands the impact of the vote.” (Herald news article, Sept. 25 “Voters demand details when it comes to taxes”). Yeah, right. Here we are, the great unwashed, saying no to funding the new jail and those who want to pick our pockets blame the poor, stupid, uninformed electorate for not fully understanding the details or the minutia of the project.

Mr. Deller, the citizens understood it perfectly. What we were trying to tell you and the rest of your ilk is you can’t request more money to feed an ever-expanding county government unless you come to us and explain why it is you can’t do with what you have. It’s nice to increase services and capacity, but when the economy is contracting, we all have to make do with less. So let it be with Caesar. I for one would like to know how the budget is being spent and would like to know if all the fat has been trimmed from this same budget. I suspect there are many areas that could be trimmed without affecting the overall performance of county government.

Don’t whine to the press that we don’t understand what it is you are asking for. We understand all too well. We have to live within our means, so will you. Have a nice day.

Marysville

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