The Battle Cry - Gotta get more Money

The Recent History Series

The Battle Cry

An Omen of Things to Come

An introduction to the Recent History series

The Master Plan – Not!

Lessons from 2001 & 2002

Renovations to the Landfill

Lessons from 2003

Lessons from 2004

Lessons from 2005

Lessons from 2006

Lessons from 2007

The Battle Cry - Gotta get more Money

The battle cry resounds at the Free Stamp City board of education

Shhh, listen… Can you hear it? The Free Stamp City board of education war drums are beating.

Is that a battle cry I hear?

To find out, let’s go visit the Free Stamp City newspaper war room to hear the latest details…

Officials from the Cleveland schools want the voters to approve another bond issue that will be funded by the already tax strapped property owners of Cleveland. They will want $217 million more dollars because they have carelessly spent the monies from the 2001 bond issue and will not have enough money to cover the 26 schools in the final phases of the project.

In a meeting with the fantasy land newspaper and its editors, school officials have stated that the 5 year old building and renovation project will run out of money in 2012 and at least $500 million more will be needed to complete the project. Those citizens who own taxable property would supply millions, while the state would provide at least $300 million to make up the difference.

The proposed plan by school officials, (most of whom do not live in Cleveland nor pay property taxes in Cleveland), would add nine more years of debt to the current 28 year bond issue. It is unfortunate that these school officials do not care about the strains this will put on the property owner citizens in Cleveland. What do they care, it’s not their money.

Can you believe it? More money needed from the property owner tax payers.

Heck in 2001 the taxpayers were promised accountability.

For all you history buffs out there, I have done some research back to the time when the first tax levy and bond issue was thrust at the voters of fantasy land. I will be writing to remind the property owners of Free Stamp City who pay property taxes of what they were promised when they approved the levy and bond issue in 2001.

I hope this jogs the memory of these property owners so history will not be repeated.

The Free Stamp City leaders have failed the public trust.

Here is a transcript from a radio program on WCPN 90.3 which was aired on March 20th, 2001. The last paragraph by Bill Rice sums up the promises made for accountability. In future blogs, I will continue to remind these tax paying voters on how the city mismanaged their tax dollars with more stories from recent history.

You can access the transcript directly by clicking here