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The Gaffer's Philosophy:
Part 37: Basic Responsibilities:
February 10, 2003:
In this essay, I want to briefly outline what I believe are the
basic responsibilities of the various groups and point out some
of the errors and excesses I see. I have already treated the issue
of the citizen's personal responsibility. Upon examination this
comes down to a matter of personal ethics. We are either a good
citizen or not. It is nothing more than a personal choice. A good
citizen will respect his neighbors and his community. He will
keep his commitments, both explicit and implicit. He will support
his community and participate when necessary. He will keep a close
watch on the government institutions to make sure they function
properly.
Concerning the home, pretty much the same philosophy applies. It is a matter of being a good citizen. In the case of children that includes being a caring parent. We see to the emotional, physical, and spiritual health of our offsprings. We especially see to their education and we actively participate in that education. This could mean making an effort to learn and understand what the kids are learning. This makes it possible to give real positive reenforcement. We should not depend on report cards or test scores for this. We should understand what the kids have done.
One of the major things needing our attention is this nurturing of our kids. I see this as the single most important issue we have to face. We need to examine what we are doing for and to our kids. I contend that we are failing miserably. If we fail in this, nothing else we do will matter. Without a healthy enlightened next generation there is no future. Therefore, the issue of caring for our young people is the first thing I will address when I get to issues.
As to communities, just for exercise, let's take a quick look at two that I am familiar with. These are the city of Flint Michigan and the township of Groveland in Michigan. These two present very different kinds of situations. Begin with Flint. It is a medium sized city in serious trouble. Flint does not act as a community because it is too large. It acts more like a group of competing gangs or tribes. Until recently, there has been an ongoing squabble between the office of the mayor and the city council. This finally culminated in the recall of the mayor.
I thought with the recall that Flint was finally turning around. We will never know because they never got a chance. It turns out that the previous governor of Michigan had been plotting to take over Flint in some kind of executive fiat. He sprang it just before the Mayor's replacement election. Now Flint is in the hands of one of the Governor's cronies. Flint had plenty of problems of it's own. It did not need the interference of an outsider with an agenda.
Much of Flint's problems are financial and cannot be solved by an outside manager. They stem from being a one industry town. Their industry was General Motors which has had an ongoing problem of its own. They had to cut cost and they did much of it by decimating the employment picture in Flint. They also closed some plants which ravaged Flint's tax base. With that reduction of employment and revenue, much of the inept management of Flint became apparent. It was always present, but losing the GM golden goose uncovered it. Because of political squabbling, the city was unable to tighten it's belt. It was business as usual until it was too late.
Flint gives us a classic picture of a city spending tax monies to act in areas outside their scope of authority. For example, cities should not own facilities for public entertainment of any kind. That is not their business. That is the proper role of commerce. Yet Flint invested in and tried to operate at least two failing public entertainment industries. One was a show place called Auto World. The other was a sports arena.
In these kind of enterprises, if it is viable and can pay for itself, commerce will do it. If not, it is dishonest of the community government to transfer the loss to the taxpayers. There is no reason in the world why people who are not interested in hockey should have to pay for the losses incurred by an amateur hockey team and poorly run arena.
The business of the community government is to operate the essential functions of the community. These are only those things which are of common interest and can impact all citizens more or less equally. We can specify police and fire protection, establishing and maintaining community parks, roadway maintenance, water supplies and sewers, pubic health, education, and trash collection. There may be other legitimate functions. None of them will be in the entertainment area.
The only proper question to ask is, "Is this of common value and interest?" The answer to that must come from an honest evaluation. The common political response, "Sure! It will bring money to the community," is not honest. It is not enough to show that local businesses might make money. Local business has the ear of city hall. Joe Taxpayer does not. For an honest evaluation, it would be necessary to show, in hard facts, how Joe Taxpayer will benefit directly. If we cannot show that, we must not do it.
Anything which favors one group's interest over the general community's interest is not the legitimate function of a community government. Convention centers which favor the local business interests at the expense of the taxpayers are not a proper function of community government. The taxpayers always get left holding the bag when government gets into the entertainment business.
The story of Flint and the previous governor's meddling would make a rather large book. We may attempt that some day, but that is not what these essays are about. I simply want to make one point very clear. That is a government's tendency to exceed its mandate. What happened in Flint is not unique to that city. Their financial failure is an all to common occurrence for many metropolises, large and small. It is always the result of mismanagement of funds.
Just one other example, in another city. The Pontiac Silver Dome is ready for the wrecker's ball. The Detroit Lions have moved out, but the city of Pontiac and the state of Michigan still owe money on that Dome. Now, where will that money come from? A handful of political hacks and local entrepreneurs benefitted from that. No one else did. Joe Taxpayer will take the loss.
Groveland Township, by contrast, is politically a very small community. It is an area of about 36 square miles containing no cities, towns, or villages of any kind. This makes it about as autonomous as possible politically. While we must still put up with county and state governments, there are no embedded or overlapping municipalities. Hence, the local political leaders are actually elected by the local voters.
There are not many voters either, although some old timers will claim we are being overrun with fools fleeing the suburbs. While the voter base has increased it is tiny by city standards. Property sizes range from one acre (about six city lots) up to a few parcels over 100 acres. So, the voters, if they wish, can exercise considerable control over how things are done here.
Sadly enough, most residents do not even bother to vote. In reality the township is run by a comfortably ensconced clique of petty bureaucrats. I suspect it will remain that way unless something goes wrong. That actually happened many years ago and I participated in a political shakeup. It was very educational. At that time the community did not support our opposition even though they knew there were serious problems within the establishment. They just didn't want to bother. Their lazy attitude made my point about rabble. Still, we had a positive effect. Our local government did improve.
This lack of interest is the main reason that the county, state, and federal governments are able to wield such enormous power. In truth, the people have simply abdicated. Although some issues are purely state and federal. The power mongers have worked overtime to obscure the opposite fact. Some issues are purely local, be it a city, village or township.
To reiterate, the local community is responsible for public safety including health, police protection, and fire protection. More important is that locally we are responsibility for primary education. In addition, we are also responsible for quality of life issues. These include the environment, property values, and human decency. One need only look at places like Taylor Michigan to see what happens when those issues are ignored. Some people there erect enormous privacy fences to keep some of the obnoxious behavior out; or in, as the case may be.
This is the big why of people fleeing the city. It is not all about crime. It is about quality of life across the board. All of these things overlap the levels of community and government. The states and feds get the leverage they need because of this overlap and citizen apathy. Thus they usurp the functions of the local community. Too often they usurp functions which are more rationally done in the local community. Their goal is to concentrate power at their level, the top.
I will insist, that everything that can be done locally should be. It will be less expensive and more appropriate. The state and federal establishments should not do anything which can be done locally. The fact that a local community does not act is not sufficient reason for a higher agency to act. There is no reason at all for a bureaucrat to assume responsibility if the local community ignores an alleged issue. This notion that the government must give us things whether we want them or not is ludicrous on the face of it.
In my next essay I will begin to outline the major issues which
we face. At this time I have defined four which I consider to
be overriding. After that I can get into the details of each major
issue and determine what needs to be done. In that I can deal
effectively with the legitimate areas of overlap. Only after I
cover the major issues will I take up the larger list of other
issues.
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