The circus came to town a little early today -- and it was the three-ring variety in Council Chambers. It was mostly a clown show with a few acrobatic moves.
First, the City has consciously chosen to mirror the fiscal gridlock paralyzing nearly all of western civilization of insisting on government spending massively more than it takes in. And that suicidal direction was only exacerbated with today's votes of the Council.
With that, the good news is that City Council today rejected the greatest part of Mayor Mallory's property tax increase. That was a major win for Cincinnati taxpayers.
The further good news is that they appear to have killed the $4.4 million glass atrium project that they approved -- inexplicably and indefensibly -- only three months ago.
However, City Council approved a tax hike to pay bonds on Mayor Mallory's capital excesses, including the Streetcar. That was a major loss for Cincinnati taxpayers.
The silver lining to that debate, however, was that it became indisputable by the Mayor and Administration that the tax hike was a direct result of issuing bonds for the Streetcar, something the Mayor had promised would not happen.
A side benefit was also that we were able to separate the men from the boys; the thinkers from the Mallory robots. Christopher Smitherman, Charlie Winburn and P.G. Sittenfeld were solid anti-tax votes. Laure Quinlivan and Wendell Young at least seemed to give thoughtful consideration to the anti-tax position, but in the end flopped around like a fish on dry land.
And poor Chris Seelbach buckled after being lied to by his own attorney, who threatened to sue Seelbach if he did not vote with the Mayor, an outrageous breach of his legal duties to the Council that required the Solicitor to state the law was something other than what it was.
Cecil Thomas, Yvette Simpson and Rozanne Qualls showed themselves to be mindless adherents to the Mallory/Dohoney policy of self-destruction of the City.
And we, the voters, put up with all this nonsense, all this lack of professionalism from the political and administrative leadership of this City. Goodness.
Craig Hochscheid, there is no point continuing to submit your vulgar smears to this site. They will all be deleted and unread. If you have any hope of posting here you will have to start acting like an adult.
ReplyDeleteAnd when they aren't vulgar, but question COAST's thoughts and actions, they'll still be deleted...
ReplyDeleteWhen will COAST get it through their thick skulls that Cincinnati voters had an agenda in 2009 and 2011? A pro-streetcar agenda as evidenced in two referendum's failing, Mallory being re-elected without even campaigning, and a council with six members all publicly supporting the streetcar during their campaigns!
ReplyDeleteI don't know Bill. Maybe they're confised because their opponents lied and said that neither referendum was about a streetcar.
ReplyDelete7/27/11
http://www.urbancincy.com/2011/07/potential-ballot-proposal-a-serious-roadblock-to-cincinnatis-future/
"This is not about the streetcar"
10/16/09
http://www.facebook.com/cincystreetcar?sk=notes&s=270#!/notes/cincinnati-streetcar/jean-francois-flechet-vote-no-on-issue-9/153660352799
"Issue 9 is NOT about the streetcar"
A quick google search turns up numerous comments saying the same for both ballot initiatives. So maybe you can get it through your thick skull - Why were the ballot initiatives "not about the streetcar" when the campaign was going on, but immediately a mandate in favor of the streetcar as soon as the election results were in?
You don't have to be a political wizard to understand that it was a very deliberate messaging strategy, born of public polling results that showed the streetcar on its own to be highly unpopular. When you consider that the pro-streetcar group outspent coast 100-1 and still only pullled off a victory of a few points it should be fairly clear, even to the thick skulled.
So I ask - were they lying before the elections, or are they lying now?