The Built-in Bailout
Feb 8th
While perusing this year’s Gainesville City Budget’s summary document, I found an interesting fact. It is fairly plain language that even a window cleaner can understand. Therefore, I pass it along to you, the other citizens who are on the hook for the high cost of government. It’s a paragraph found near the top of page 10, and here is the important excerpt:
“Pension obligations are met primarily through three sources of funds. Employee contributions to the fund are set at a fixed percentage of pay. Investment returns on pension assets comprise a substantial portion of pension funding, and the balance of funding required comes from contributions from the employer. Therefore, poor investment return years require higher contributions from the employer to meet required funding levels.”
In case you are missing something here, we, the taxpayers, are the employers. The other important thing to notice is that you, the employer, are obligated to meet funding obligations when investments have a bad year. So, all of you who took a hit in 2008, losing about 40% of your retirement investments, have to bite the bullet to keep the city pension fund from failing to make money.
Keeping in mind that this is, after all, a defined benefits plan, we will not get into the details of whether such an expensively insured plan is mitigated with below average return on investment anyway. But it does indicate that the city should hire employees and create new departments only when the gravest need arises. There are not many companies that can survive not only an economic downturn, but having to insulate its employees from this effect with money it no longer has.
City employees who like this arrangement (and who wouldn’t?) should want to insure this arrangement’s long term viability by helping its employer to NOT incur deficits. But deficits are what we have, and that could be the case for years to come if we do not get some hard-times discipline.
Stay tuned to this blog as I visit other budgetary challenges that could be met with your money and your lack of opportunity.
My Speech at the Tea Party Rally
Feb 7th
I want to thank everyone who came out for this event. It looked like there were 500 people to me, but the Sun says 1,000, so who knows? I had yard signs and window clings available. We got donations and volunteers to sign up. It was a great event!
Video from Monday’s forum
Feb 4th
This video is a clip from my opening statement at the African American Accountability Alliance candidate forum on February 1. It’s what I would call “the elevator speech” about why I am running. There are many things to cover, like GRU and the tree-burning plant, but that came only a little bit later. There were no questions about it, so you had to try to squeeze that into the 90 seconds you were given to answer questions that really had 5 minute answers if you were going to come even close to doing them justice.
I will have signs…
Feb 3rd
This Saturday I will be speaking at the Gainesville Tea Party Freedom Rally. It will be at the Gainesville Target Range from noon until 3pm. I will have a table set up and there will be yard signs and window clings for your vehicles.
Six more weeks of campaigning
Feb 2nd
I don’t even have to see my shadow this morning to know that there will be six more weeks of campaigning
Happy Groundhog Day, everybody! I participated in the 4-A’s (African American Accountability Alliance) Forum last night, and although I thought I performed well, I did not receive their endorsement. Sitting City Commissioner Craig Lowe did, which goes to show you that the 20 or so voting members were not among those who felt burned by Lowe’s ramming through of the Transgender Bathroom Ordinance, even likening it to the Civil Rights struggle of the 1960s. In the district 4 race, they also endorsed Penny Wheat.
I’m glad I went. I will not shrink back. I am moving on! And I will try to have the video clips processed for tomorrow.
First Forum of the Campaign!
Jan 25th
I have always looked forward to the candidate forums, and we will be starting with what I think is the best. The 4As (African American Accountability Alliance) is always well attended, and the debate is always lively. Most gratifying is that they also make an endorsement at the end of the night, and it’s not an empty one. The candidate they endorse usually gets help on his or her campaign. This forum is on Monday, February 1, at 6pm. It’s located at the Alachua County Health Department Building behind the Food Lion on Hawthorne Rd. It’s proper address is 224 SE 24th St, Gainesville, FL.
Come on out! And bring camcorders!
I will be on Talk of the Town today
Jan 25th
If Ed Braddy and Jake Fuller will have me today, I will be on their show sometime between 12 and 1pm. You can hear them on 99.5 FM. Ed and I talked about this the other day, and I believe all systems are go!
Although TV20 has already announced my campaign for Mayor, this will be the first media announcement made by me. And that’s if you don’t count YouTube!
The first speech of my campaign
Jan 24th
I gave this speech at the Tea Party Meeting in Jonesville yesterday. I talked about the willful act of voting…and making donations to my campaign!
Don’s campaign blog
Jan 23rd
In the interest of total transparency, I will use this blog to interact with the voters of Gainesville, FL. I want to be your next Mayor, and I want a real open dialog.
