Newspaper Page Text
Page 4A
The Braselton News
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
The Braselton News
braseltonnews.com
Mike Buffington Editor & Co-Publisher
General Phone: 706-367-5233
Opinion
“Difference of opinion leads
to enquiry, and enquiry to
truth. ” -Thomas Jefferson
our views
Barrow finances look strong,
but tough decisions are ahead
WHEN IT comes to government finance, eyes tend to glaze over.
Most people want to know just the basics and whether or not their
local governments are financially sound or fiscally struggling.
For the Barrow County government, the short answer is this: Coun
ty finances appear to be strong, although the slowing economy is
having an impact on local government revenues.
But a true look at government financial numbers is more complex
than such a broad-brush summary.That’s why this newspaper is pre
senting a page of analysis numbers this week based on the Barrow
County audit for FY07. These details are published to show both the
details and complexity of local government financial issues.
In FY07, Barrow County was in the black, spending less money
than it took in. Its general fund reserves appear to be strong at $9
million and its overall debt appears to be reasonable based on the
size of the population and county budget.
Part of the reason Barrow had strong finances in FY07 was due to
a large leap in property tax income. That income jumped from $10.5
million in FY06 to $15 million in FY07. No doubt, much of that was
due to the additional tax base that has been built in the county over
the last couple of years.
So far in FY08, revenues have been holding up. For the first five
months of FY08, tax revenues were up by 11 percent and court fines
were up 17 percent. Because of that, overall revenues for the first five
months were up 5.7 percent over last year. Whether that trend holds
true for the coming months remains to be seen.
But there are some warning signs in the revenue stream. The 2007
audit showed that the county’s sales tax income was already stag
nating, being slightly down from 2006. The worsening economy will
likely keep sales tax revenues down in 2008 and some projections
indicate it might be off by $400,000 by the end of the current fiscal
year.
In addition, the housing bust will keep zoning fees, building permits
and other growth-related revenues flat during the year. Those items
were already slowing in 2007 and have slowed even more this year.
Through the first five months of FY08, licenses and permits revenue
was down 35 percent compared to the same period the year before.
Hopefully, good management will make sure the county weathers
the current economic downturn without having to dip into county re
serves. So far in FY08, the county has managed to hold its expenses
down. Through the first five months, expenses were running 3.5 per
cent under last year. In addition most areas of county government
have been under budget for the first five months. It’s apparent that
somewhere along the way, someone is looking at keeping county
costs in line.
So despite the overall gloomy economic conditions, the Barrow
County government has not yet gotten caught in a huge financial
squeeze. Unlike some counties, Barrow is in a good position to meet
its financial challenges, if it can continue to control its costs during
this period of revenue stagnation.
That means, in part, that the county can’t afford to throw money at
new projects that don’t have a solid return on investment. The pro
posed Northeast Georgia Convention and Arts Center, for example,
could become a financial black hole requiring large county subsidies
in the future. More study is needed on that idea so that it doesn’t be
come financial boondoggle either in the short-term or the long-term.
Another danger is that the last few years of growth allowed Bar-
row to rapidly expand the size of its government from a $24 million
general fund in FY05 to a $33 million enterprise at the end of FY07.
That kind of rapid growth in government can’t be sustained during an
economic recession and slowing revenues.
This economic downturn is a true test of Barrow’s leadership and
government structure. It’s relatively easy to run a government when
money is pouring from double-digit growth.
It’s making tough decisions today, when times are lean, that is the
real mark of strong leadership and good government.
Braseltoons
by Jotn Sheppard
"Remember kid, bob and weave, bob and weave."
letters
Upset with water
restrictions
Dear Editor:
I received my notice in today’s Barrow
County water bill. I am disappointed that
we are still unable to utilize our sprinkler
system at least one day a week and wash
my car at home at least one day a week.
Hand watering is wasteful folks; runoff
occurs.
I have to drive 10 miles each way to
a carwash to pay a minimum of $6 for a
lousy hand wash job. Has further devel
opment been halted until the water situa
tion can be worked out?
Why buy a house when you can’t have
even a limited level of convenience built
in?
Sincerely,
Hank Spinnler
Hoschton
Please respond
to invitations
Dear Editor:
“Repondez s’il vous plait”, a French
phrase thattranslates to “Please respond”.
It is with this meaning that invitation cards
and similar documents are often marked
with “R.S.V.P.” or “Regrets Only.”
Our lives are so busy that people for
get: Be courteous to others.
Yes, the economy sucks, gas prices
are rising and trying to feed a family on
a budget is a mission in itself. If some
one dies out of the blue you pick up the
phone and call, or if someone breaks the
law, you call the police. But if you send
an invitation to attend a birthday party,
no one calls to “RSVP” or “REGRETS
ONLY.”
Birthday parties outside of the home
are all package deals now so parents of
the birthday child spend quite an amount
for a birthday party. That’s by choice and
that’s what we love to do for our kids.
However, the host of the party does hope
that those magical words of “RSVP” or
“REGRETS ONLY” on the invitation may
possibly prompt the “invited” to respond
so the parents can accommodate as
needed.
It’s not rocket science folks. Most
Americans have at least two operational
phones in their possession 24/7. Use
them!
My regrets to all who operate on this
level.
Sincerely,
Jennifer DuBois
Braselton
Values should be
reassessed now
Dear Editor:
I agree that property assessments
should take place immediately. In fact, in
September, I questioned Jackson County
Tax Commissioner Don Elrod about doing
just that.
His answer was unacceptable. Mr.
Elrod agreed that the housing market has
taken a hit, “But that doesn’t mean values
have dropped,” he said.
Duh! Citizens who have their taxes
raised on a rising market should have
them lowered on a declining market and
should not be expected to file into the
county Tax Assessors office, one by one,
requesting them to re-consider the value
of their property.
Sincerely,
Dave Oliver
Hoschton
Legislative session went down the drain
THE LATEST session of the Georgia General Assembly is one that will be
remembered more for what didn’t get done, as opposed to what did.
The high hopes that Republicans had for implementing tax relief, funding
transportation improvements, upgrading trauma care, and de
emphasizing public education through private school vouch
ers went down the drain on the session’s final day.
They were all, to some extent, victims of the bickering
between Speaker Glenn Richardson and Lt. Gov. Casey
Cagle, as well as the absence of Gov. Sonny Perdue.
“It is hard to call this session a resounding success,” Senate
President Pro Tern Eric Johnson said after it was all over. “We
could have done better.”
Johnson was among those legislators whose dreams went
down in flames, as his school voucher bill and his legislation
to ban robo-calling by political candidates both failed to pass.
There are a lot of other lawmakers complaining about pet bills
that died as well.
To be fair, the session was not completely lacking in accom
plishments. Lawmakers did perform their constitutionally
obligated duty of adopting a state budget and even managed to do it with several
hours to spare on the final day instead of ramming it through in the final minutes.
Legislators also managed to adopt a statewide water management plan and two
bills that were heavily lobbied by influential, out-of-state interests: a revision of the
state’s certificate of need laws that will allow Cancer Treatment Centers of America
to build a controversial cancer facility in metro Atlanta and an NRA-backed rewrite
of the state’s gun law that will allow firearms to be carried in state parks, restau
rants that serve alcohol, and MARTA trains headed for the airport.
The biggest failure of many was the inability to achieve closure on the signature
issue of the session, taxes. This is a failure that likely will reverberate for months
as Richardson, Cagle, and Perdue blame each other for the deadlock.
Richardson spent more than a year talking up his plan to eliminate property
taxes, making more than a hundred speeches and appearances around the state.
Opposition from local governments forced him to retreat to a measure that would
have eliminated the property tax on license tags, but even that slimmed-down
measure died in the session’s waning hours.
Cagle and the Senate put out their plan for tax relief, a 10-percent decrease
in state income tax rates, but that failed to gain traction. A last-ditch attempt to
salvage the elimination of the tag tax also foundered - this was the fault, accord
ing to Richardson, of Cagle, who allegedly kept moving the goal posts to keep
negotiators from reaching an agreement.
“When you go home on the tag tax, tell everybody that it has a new name,”
Richardson said in an angry speech to the House shortly before adjournment.
“It’s called the Cagle birthday tax, and every time they pay it, they can think of
Casey Cagle because Casey Cagle solely and exclusively left it on for them. And
I hope Georgians by the nine million will thank him and flood him with emails and
tell him we’re sick of Casey Cagle. It’s time to get a new lieutenant governor in
this state.”
“It was my hope that we would come to an agreement on tax cuts and we
came to the table, many times, in good faith ready to achieve true tax relief for
Georgians,” Cagle replied. “It is unfortunate that those who were in the position
to join us in providing tax relief were blinded by ego and unwilling to come to an
agreement.”
The one person missing from the drama of the final day was Perdue, who flew
to China on a Delta Air Lines junket and was still thousands of miles away as the
session crashed to a close Friday evening.
Capitol observers noted that past governors stayed close at hand, even sleep
ing in their offices, during the final days of General Assembly sessions so that they
could influence negotiations on the state budget and other burning issues. Not
Perdue, even though he said before his departure that the tax cut proposals from
both the House and Senate were not a good idea with an economic slowdown
threatening state revenue collections.
As it turned out, even in the governor’s absence the tax cut measures he dis
liked so much did not pass. In a session dominated by negative events, that was
only fitting.
Tom Crawford is the editor of Capitol Impact’s Georgia Report, an Internet news
site at www.gareport.com that covers government and politics in Georgia.
Saying ‘sorry’
years later
THERE’S a network television show
that I occasionally enjoy watching.
Its premise is that a guy made some
poor decisions in his life that contrib
uted to him committing petty crimes.
Years later, he realizes that he should
turn his life around and try to repay
the people he hurt with good deeds.
It makes me
wonder: Who, in
my life, would I
apologize to for the
things I’ve done?
The first would
have to be Mrs.
Wood, my middle
school math
teacher. Being
a middle school
teacher can’t be
easy — especially
when you’ve got
brats like me de
termined to make
things worse.
I had learned to hate math by that
point — and Mrs. Wood was the
unfortunate teacher who landed me
in her classroom. Strange enough,
I excelled in my other subjects and
was even designated as that kid who
would keep an eye on the class when
the teacher stepped out of the room.
That wasn’t the case in Mrs. Wood’s
classroom.
No, I was that kid who earned the
notorious chair next to the teacher’s
desk. The spot guaranteed that Mrs.
Wood would always keep a close eye
on me — and any trouble I was brew
ing among the other students.
I was nasty to Mrs. Wood. I inten
tionally tried to make her time in the
classroom miserable because I hated
math (and I still do). I was a bratty kid.
Period.
One time, out of frustration, she
asked me if I knew what the word
“sarcastic” meant. I must have done
something to justify that question.
In a whinny voice, I said: “No, Mrs.
Wood, what THAT mean?”
As an adult, I regret being such
a pain to Mrs. Wood. She was de
termined to teach me math and I
gave her undue grief. I recently tried
finding her on my old middle school’s
website, but there was no sign of her.
Hopefully, she didn’t become one of
those good teachers run off by some
bratty kids, like me.
So, Mrs. Wood, I’m sorry for being
such a mean kid. You didn’t deserve
that.
I’d also apologize to the kids I
picked on at school. That would
include elementary, middle and high
school.
I wasn’t the kind of kid to land in the
principal’s office, but I do remember
teasing other students or pulling small
pranks. It’s stuff that most people
probably did when they were kids, but
we were wrong to do it. Those re
marks and pranks were always mean
spirited in nature. I, too, was on the
receiving end of similar comments,
but I still did it to other kids.
Even in college, I joined my friends
in teasing a roommate. We were
adults then — we could drive cars,
vote and pay rent, but we still acted
like bratty school kids.
So, to all those kids I unfairly teased
in school, I’m sorry. I knew it was
wrong to do those things to you, but I
followed the crowd.
I probably don’t apologize enough
for the things I’ve done wrong. Too
many people in this country seem to
never say sorry. We all make mistakes
— even if it takes years for us to real
ize them.
Kerri Testement is news editor of
The Braselton News. Her e-mail ad
dress is kerri@mainstreetnews.com.
Kerri
Testement
kerri@mainstreet-
news.com
The Braselton News
A Publication of Mainstreet Newspapers, Inc.
Mike Buffington Editor &
Co-Publisher
Scott Buffington Co-Publisher
Angela Gary Managing Editor
Kerri Testement News Editor
Kristi Reed Sports Editor
Jeremy Ginn Advertising
Susan Tredwell Advertising
Web Sites: BraseltonNews.com
BarrowJournal. com
General Phone: 706-367-5233
