Richard Rowley
Last Tuesday I had the honor to represent our community as Budget Committee chairman and attest to our City Council that the 2011-12 budget before them for adoption, was reviewed and approved by majority vote of the Budget Committee in accord with our city statutes.
I’ve been on the committee for a number of years and this is the first year that I was not able to say that the budget was unanimously approved. Unanimity is not required; however, it is nice.
When I was on the City Council, we didn’t always agree. I am proud to say though that when we didn’t, our disagreements were civil and our support of the final decision was professional. This same character is present with regard to the budget.
The controversy with the budget has to do with the allocation of funds to charitable organizations within our community. The gist is that funds given to the city should not be doled out to non-city programs.
Please consider the ramifications of this position. First, our funds are not “given” to the city. Taxes are taken from us regardless our desire. Taxes pay for necessary services, infrastructure improvement and maintenance, support for citizen quality of life and much more.
With regard to quality of life, I don’t believe any of us want to see people left hungry, unprotected from family abuse or shut in and without some periodic contact.
So how do we address this? I see three choices:
1) Do nothing.
2) Establish city programs to perform these services.
3) Subsidize existing, reputable, non-profit organizations already performing these services.
The third option is what we selected. If you are of the “do nothing” crowd, our choice was not reasonable. I do not berate you for this opinion and actually am quite sympathetic toward it.
To those in the “do something” camp I suggest that option 3 is the most prudent. To do something, we need a means to do it. It would be cost prohibitive to establish bureaucratic oversight and delivery mechanisms necessary to provide these services.
The amount that we directed to these organizations is a small percentage of funds allocated to the building reserve fund from which they were redirected. It does not threaten saving towards building a City Hall, yet in these times of financial struggle these funds will make a difference.
Allocation such as these is not new. We have done this in previous budgets. However to be fair, we need an application process allowing all such organizations to apply for assistance. Included would be an accountability procedure detailing how funds are disbursed and what reporting is needed to verify their receipt and use.
Our city motto proclaims, “Sweet Home – Oregon at Its Best!” Providing modest funds to support young, old, abused and struggling citizens through existing organizations is a sterling example of “Sweet Home at Its Best.”
Richard Rowley, a former Sweet Home City Council member, is chairman of the city’s Budget Committee.