Looks as though several city council members are “Smithing” out of decision making. Bill Lover, Micah Cawley, Rick Ensey, (the three amigos) and Cathy Coffee and Norm Johnson all stated they wouldn’t raise license tabs for repaving our major arterials unless approved by a vote of the people. How noble!
The fact of the matter is that the County Commissioners have ruined the vote of the people process with their poisonous advisory ballot last November. They had no political will to sell the voters on planned resurfacing and infrastructure needs. They simply punted the question to the voters without a plan. They knew it would fail and wasted taxpayer time and money guaranteeing its failure. It failed with an 81% majority.
Mayor Dave Edler has brought the $20 car tab issue to the city’s table during a Yakima Herald interview. This needs to be discussed and debated openly and honestly. There are those that will demonize anyone who even mentions that we find a way to fund needed infrastructure projects. The demonizers (who will surface soon) should be totally ignored, as they have no interest in our city being a vibrant and attractive place to live.
Several points need to be made about a $20 car tab fee. The money should be exclusively used for repaving major arterials with a written plan of prioritized streets. The money collected should not be bonded to larger projects that indebt us in the future and assuredly would cause increases in the fee. It should be pay as you go. Pave as much as we can as the money comes in. In this way the $20 car tab makes sense. A dedicated revenue stream paid by those who use the roads.
Already Bill Lover is misleading the public by saying he will look into the budget to find money in other places. This is a replay of last year when he and Micah Cawley said they were looking into the budget to come up with recommendations to make 2 million dollars in cuts to allow us to hire 15 more police. They never offered one single recommendation for the council to vote on and not one single policeman was hired through their shenanigans. They wasted taxpayer money and time promising to deliver without an increase in taxes. They need to be held accountable for last year and future charades they plan on using to stall the $20 car tab beyond the 2009 election.