BUDGETS FOR SERVICES or SERVICES ON A BUDGET!!!

By Joe Ingino You can tell the type of success a company has by the way they configure their services vs budgets to accommodate the same. No matter the product or service. If your budgeted costs are not reflective of your product and service. Normally you either run a deficit or profit. In the case of municipal government. Budgets have become a run away train. A train that driver speeds up on the last quarter in order to justify asking for more in order to maintain the same level of services. This is wrong. Good leadership would look at each department within the administration and access the profit and loss or in laymans term. Cost vs waste. Most elected do not have the intellectual capabilities to perform such tasks. Therefore they depend highly on staff. Staff that are part of the problem with the assignment of policy. Some municipalities have gone as far as suggesting the hiring of an internal auditor. More taxpayers money wasted to do what the municipal manager should be doing. Unfortunately the municipal manager in many cases has become institutionalize and due to the salary they collect. These managers do not rock the boat in any way in fear of department heads turning on them and potentially affect their employment. It has become customary for all municipalities to claim that tax increases are need in order to maintain same quality of service. This not taking into consideration the fact of an influx of new properties increasing the tax coffers for the City. Instead they claim that due to cost of living departments need more revenue. This not taking into consideration departmental waste in perks and special projects that never materialize. Personally we have spent to long having department demand increase in budgets for services. The reality is that services are not getting better but instead in some cases worst. Then the reality should be that administrators be auditing each department. Look for cuts in waste. Assign budget after carefully analysis the services. Cut duplication. Cut unnecessary pockets of reserves. Assure that each employee is productive and accountable. Managers should be able to set budget for each department to assure adequate services. Tax increases have become fashionable for municipalitys Unbearable for the average taxpayer. Sadly, many running do not have the corporate experience to even begin looking. Others, have no administrative experience and follow the status quo in order not to expose their ignorance of management. At the end of the day what do we get? More taxes to the point some people are loosing their homes. Others can’t afford to buy as the deposit is out of touch for many and the taxes and utilities just put home ownership out of reach for many. Personally I strongly believe that we must rid of municipal government. It has become to expensive to operate. By cutting waste. We can re-invest back in the community. But so then who will drive the bus? With the development of Artificial Intelligence. I strongly believe that someone will come up with a GTP style system where you enter all the info that is already on line. let the A.I. analyze and break down the administrative protocol and let it. Give us suggestions on outcomes. The legal community already has a system that plays out different defenses and scenarios for lawyers to consider. Why not for municipal administrations? Financial realms also operate off A.I. platforms. The future is bright. The future is full of uncertainty. One thing for sure. We can’t keep going the way we are. Humanity has been stretched to the max. Over population and the level of misinformation and confusion is at a critical level. We need to re-evaluate civilization as we can’t keep going the way we are. Over population if it has taught us anything is that it leading us to our demise. Scholars have speculated that humanity is it’s worst enemy... that famine, disease or war will eventually finish us off. Ancient civilization that have appeared to dissolve into the wind... are writing on the wall that we should all take serious. We are today faced with a municipal election. A time we get to pick someone from the population to represent our best interest. Unfortunately many running are not capable of leading and in many cases either looking for a better jor or a job. These individuals is not what society needs. We need either administrators to run and administration or we need A.I type of systems to logically think with the background intel to make up scenarios that best suits our or civilizations interests. The future is bright. No matter who we vote. The suffering will continue. Democracy has failed us.