As the Brothers of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Incorporated say, "a voteless people is a hopeless people". After all my forebears went through to secure & insure my right to vote, I strive to never miss an election. Regardless if whether or not my view is the majority, whether or not my candidate wins, my voice will be heard.
Tuesday was the date for the local municipal elections. City council seats were up for vote, as well as two proposals requesting funds from the populace:
As usual, the people have spoken. One proposal that irked me was "Issue 2". Essentially, the local City Council makes $6,250 per council member per year at present. Yeah, it's not much. Yeah, they work on Council issues "part time". It is a substantial amount of work, however. The folk who do it well are worth more than $6,250 yearly. I get it.
What irked me was the wording of the issue on the ballot. The phrase "one half of the salary of the mayor" was used to determine the amount of the raise. For this date, the new council salary would increase to $48,000 with passage of Issue 2. There was no public disclosure of how that formula was conceived. It could have been a "Wild Audit Guess", for all we know.
Even the mayor didn't support the proposal in its' current form. The mayor felt the potential raise "should be addressed as part of a larger review of the city charter". A politician being reasonable regarding citizens' dollars? To me, it's was a refreshing surprise.
I am not opposed to the idea of city council folks getting a raise. I was opposed to the open-ended phrasing of the proposal. If those in power wanted each council member to make $48K a year, why not include that exact phrase in the ballot proposal? It would have clarified the issue, and maybe gotten more support.
In this age of nebulous, misleading statements, our local ballot writers/issue describers did the process a disservice. Do better next time. Write clearer next time. Get to the point, and maybe next time I'll support your proposal.
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