Published: June 29, 2009 09:27 pm      

Rippy: Are we sheep, lemmings or maybe something greater?

Have you noticed that when times are tough and money is tight the approach that seems to always surface is fear?

A lot of our state leaders appear to think that if they scare and threaten us enough with reduction of needed services, they will be able to enact additional spending without protest. This is the action they take when times are tough and revenue is down. When the economy is in the tank and people are really hurting, this is their approach to asking for more money. They ask for increases in things like income tax, increases in fees and a myriad of other charges to increase revenue. They appear to do these types of actions at the absolute worst possible time.

It does not take long for some of the best intentioned legislators to learn the fear game. They always start with the threat of shutting down or stopping the funding for what appears to be the most needed services. Notice how they will always find a way to publicize those that are near to our hearts. Who wants to even consider cutting child care, child advocacy, education, healthcare, senior services, legal immigrant services or anything affecting those needed areas? I can answer that question for 98.9 percent of us. No one! The mention of a child or elderly person suffering will affect all but the hardest of hearts. This is the reason that the majority of us do not protest when they start their fear campaign to keep us moving in the right direction just like a group of sheep. C’mon, who can stand up to the thought of not supporting kids and senior’s?

Did you ever stop to think what you would have to do if you were in the same situation as our state? Just suppose that a reduction in your personal income because of layoff, reduced hours or reduced hourly wages that you were faced with a big budget shortfall. I can almost guarantee that the same 98.9 percent who would not want to consider cuts in services to children and seniors would find other areas of their budget to reduce. Their kids or an aging parent would not be the first areas they consider. They would not be interested in “fear mongering” and they would not have any way to increase their income by raising taxes or fees. They would have to reduce their spending in other areas. They would have no choice, but I will wager you that reducing anything necessary for their kids or an aging loved one would not be at the top of the list of reductions. They would explore every other area possible for reduction.

I do not doubt the need for a balanced budget and improvement in the revenue side of the ledger. Just look at the history of leadership in this state and all of the waste that has been documented. It is obvious that years and years of mismanagement along with the financial crisis has brought this state to the brink of insolvency. We are somewhat of joke to other areas of the United States. We have a lot of cartoons and bumper stickers about our past and recent history. Some of them would be funny if what they portray was not so sad. They attempt in a humorous way to point out the many examples of failed leadership in our state over the past decades.

Maybe it is time to approach things differently. Maybe we should ask our representatives to look in detail at every line item in the budget, break it down in detail and explain to us any line item that has increased above inflation in any of the past five years. We should insist on a public explanation of any increase that exceeded inflation. We should also demand an explanation of any project, program, agency or department added over the past five years and justification for doing so. Most families and every company knows that when they are in dire straits that both sides of the ledger are in play, revenue and expense. Our state leaders needs to make sure they have really researched and wrung out from the expense side every thing they possibly can before increasing taxes and fees. Any well run business would do this because increasing revenue is usually not possible in bad economic times. They should stop trying to make us feel bad with fear mongering and threats to eliminate agencies and programs that affect the hearts of everyone. They should prove conclusively and with full transparency that every increase over inflation for the past five years or so has been reviewed in detail and the same review has been conducted for every new project, program or department.

Maybe they could look at the “Feast of Pork” reported recently that included a reported gazebo in Willowbrook, a new university campus for Chicago’s west side, just part of the $3.1 billion in projects that ranged from $50,000 for a fire truck in Rockford to $40 million for a Chicago State University Campus to be built somewhere on the city’s west Side. They reported this bill detailing all the pork was 972 pages long. Some of these are probably very good projects, but when we are being threatened with a huge income tax increase, large increases in fees such as license plates etc., what is more important — dropping the pork or cutting services to kids and seniors?

Maybe it is time that we hold the top leaders — such as our governor — accountable to use some well known and proven management techniques instead of flying around the state creating fear to get his programs passed at the expense of the taxpayer. We have been treated like sheep for a long time. If we continue down this path, we will be the proverbial lemmings following each other over the cliff. Maybe it is time for us to send a change message rather than always having it delivered to us. What do you think?