Every
day we hear, read and see more information that shows our legislators have been
very generous with our money. The State
of
Years
ago we had smaller governments paying less than private industry and our
legislators gave generous retirement benefits. Many people worked for government until a
private sector job came along. Then
government said they would raise payscales to keep their workers and compete
with private industry. Unfortunately
there were no measurements to determine who were productive workers and who
weren’t. So the mediocre worker stays in
his position. One such worker sits on
the
That
City Council member now is in the position to pay more people in his image and
stick the taxpayers with the bill.
Our
legislators (in Glendale there are 5 sitting as a body called the City Council)
have created a new class of society, the enriched City Employee that not only
is well paid by any standard but can retire at up to 90% of their last year
salary.
We
all have heard that Social Security will run out in this century but when
knowledgeable people speak about government pension programs like CALPERS or
CALSTERS, the voter is conflicted because he/she wants to believe their Council
is looking out for the people of Glendale and have a hard time understanding
that there is only so much revenue and it is reducing due to the recession
while personnel costs continue to rise.
Politicians
and Management use scare tactics so you will blindly follow them. In several days you have an opportunity to
review what council members are up for re-election and how much they have
helped reduce spending – think school resource officers, traffic enforcement,
reduced library and parks hours –
they, like the State, have robbed the treasury to pay those salaries and we
have seen the result of pandering to employees…the independent expenditures for
a constant barrage of mailers and walking the streets to keep the overtime
coming.
Just before the election
you heard that the FireFighters will give up $3,000,000 of COLA for the next
two years but you did not hear them say they would cut the estimated
$16,000,000 worth of overtime or change the City’s share of Calpers pension, of
at least $35,000 a firefighter, or $20,000 for medical insurance or $15,000 for
compensation insurance.
One way you can help
restore accountability is to vote NO on the UUT. Another is to vote out-of-office those that
have shown they have no fiscal accountabilty and vote in those that support
fiscal accountability.
Unlike the Unions and
the GNP, Vanguardians doesn‘t take taxpayer money from the City; we are
supported by the contributions from our community. Even though there are many restrictions placed
on 501C3 organizations by the Federal government we can take positions like the
Vote NO on the UUT. We cannot endorse
candidates for election, nor can we support or oppose them. We can rate them and that is what we did with
the help of the voters. The three highest rated candidates are listed below[1].
We encourage you to
review the issues and the candidates’ stance on them. Vote wisely, intelligently and for the best
interest of
Barry Allen
Publisher of the
Vanguard Weekly News
[1] Ratings for City Council
Candidates:
Bruce Philpott #1 with a score of 87
Bob Yousefian #2 with a score of 82