11-27-08, “Rube Goldberg meets our tax and spend councilmen”, by Herbert Molano

Get set... ready...tax. Next coming election Glendale voters may get a chance to vote themselves an additional tax burden. From what I gather, our dear city councilmen in their ever concern about the people who elected them will give them the opportunity to give themselves another swift kick in the rear. We may well need a Rube Goldberg machine. You know, those complex contraptions that allow you to do the simplest thing with the most complex and needless mechanical ingenuity.

Instead of truly reducing costs, which would be the simplest and wisest thing to do, they plan to add to the April ballot the option of self-inflicting another layer to the utility users tax to your communications bill. I think I'll be purchasing a ring-tone that will sound like a cash register every time it rings. That'll be the sound of money being sucked out into what is very likely one of the most mismanaged budgets in the history if Glendale – Cachinggg!

During this thanksgiving, let's be thankful that many people have caught on to their irrepressible desire of councilmen to hand out monetary favors to their favorite managers. In 2006-2007 they gave the top 50 employees over 1 million dollars in salary increases. How sweeeet it is! You ask the councilmen how it is that they can justify such action, and they'll tell you that it’s the competitive rate. If they don't hand out those salary increases, we will lose them to another city. Omigosh! Lock these precious people in. Please Sire, don't let them go! We'll be lost in the woods without them!

But dare to ask them about performance, and they all seem to have lost their hearing aids. In 2001 when the city started the police building, they assigned a project manager who was unqualified as a project manager, with hardly any construction experience. Which manager approved such an unimaginable assignment to handle a project with costs in the tens of millions? Who was ultimately responsible for the project over-runs in the tens of millions, and lawsuits galore? No one. So managers want the money, but their decisions are never part of the evaluation package. Just fork over the money and never mind about results....Cachinnng!

So, once again I took a look at the Bureau of Justice Crime Reports for Irvine, California and Glendale, California. You don't hear much about these from this city council because they want to compare themselves with cities that are in much worse condition than we are. Let's take a look at crime statistics. Don't forget that today both cities have equivalent populations.

Between 1994 and 2004 violent and property crime has dropped significantly across the USA. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, youth crime alone has dropped by 62%. Since 2004 Glendale started pouring money into public safety like there is no tomorrow. You know, so that they can get that coveted line on their campaign endorsement brochures with a sworn guy in uniform.

Violent crimes per 10,000 residents in 1994 – Irvine: 13.58, Glendale: 37.62

Violent crimes per 10,000 residents in 2006 - Irvine: 6.7, Glendale: 18.23

At first you may think that both cities had comparable reductions in crime, albeit Irvine is a whole lot safer. But what you can find about Irvine that you can't find about Glendale is how many of the arrests result in convictions.

Property Crime per 10,000 residents in 1994 – Irvine: 373, Glendale: 369

Property Crime per 10,000 residents in 2006 – Irvine: 161, Glendale: 194

Those are numbers of filed police reports. Now try to find the number of arrests and convictions as a measure of performance. But you won't find it for Glendale. Why you may ask? Because it is much easier to give salaries on these bouncing salary comparisons: “Hey, they got more money than I did...that's not fair. I am going to pout and hold my breath until you raise my salary.”

I'll be sending the PDF files to Hal Weber to post on his website. There you can see the numbers from the Bureau yourself. In the mean time, if you invent a contraption to kick yourself for not asking for accountability from city officials, I'll welcome your design entry.

Herbert Molano