Promises, Promises!
The nice thing about elections is looking forward to the elected officials keeping their promises. Holding elected official’s feet to the fire seems to be a never ending job. The further away from an election the more likely those promises seem to get forgotten. I figured I’d take this opportunity to remind the public of a few promises I heard during the recent Gilford elections.
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Newly elected Budget Committee member Dale Dormody said that he was a fiscal conservative and was concerned about rising property taxes. He also said that he would abstain from Library budget votes. We could assume that he would also abstain from municipal employee’s salaries and benefit votes since State Law may require him to. I look forward to listening to Mr. Dormody’s ideas on where the town can save money. His silence on the library budget was made very easy on Election Day.
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I had the pleasure of standing next to the good folks with the “Free Library” signs. I heard them, countless times, promise voters that the new “free” library wouldn’t come with a bigger budget or more employees. I think this is fantastic for the residents of Gilford and I’m looking forward to seeing the results.
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On the school district side of things we’ll just have to see how they proceed with the minor budget difference. I’m always amazed when elected officials praise the wisdom of a few hundred deliberative session attendees but when a few thousand voters show up on Election Day, they are “misinformed”. Does that include why so many “misinformed” people voted for her? [Margo Weeks]
I must be misinformed about all the pending staff and program cuts. I’m hoping the administrators aren’t going to the old tactic of cutting the programs that anger people the most. It seems by all appearances they got the message from the voters and even though some of them think the voters are “misinformed”, the math is pretty obvious to even the dimmest of bulbs.
Let’s do some quick math shall we?
There wasn’t taxpayer funding for football last year so there’s $36K.
During the budgeting season the districts leaders vowed that they would fund the staff benefits regardless of the budget vote so there’s another $34K.
If the district leaders were listening to the voters they could erase $34K immediately by seeking a $5 and $10 a week employee contribution toward healthcare. This is a minor amount compared to most any job in the private sector and as one wealthy member of community put it, “amounts to less than the cost of a cup of coffee a day!”
As for the minor balance? How about hiring a part time Assistant Principal instead of the full time position that is currently open? How about a little less increase in the raises and benefits for an already top heavy administration?
Could someone please tell me if any of these suggestions affect the quality of the education delivered in Gilford?
