05/22/2008: "Loan"

The Council just voted to approve another loan. This time it was for 2 million dollars. By some bizarre twist of logic the lender was the Public Works department. That’s correct. The Council voted to borrow 2 million from the road fund to pay for storm water projects in Eastsound. At least they got a good interest rate.

Apparently this money was just lying around collecting dust, but if it wasn’t needed why did they take it from the taxpayers in the first place? Who knows? But this is just the tip of the iceberg.

In 2007 this council confiscated $782,511.00 against the will of the people of San Juan County for storm water projects. They managed to get this money before a referendum stopped them from taking more. The Public Works department, by order of the repealed Ordinance 20, was required to transfer $320,443, into this sum from the road fund. This year’s budget added another $208k specifically for Eastsound’s storm water infrastructure from the facility improvement fund. This money was to be exclusively reserved for storm water projects.

What happened to these funds? Why did the Council vote to loan more money from a department that was given almost a million toward building Eastsound’s storm water system? Is there anything to show for the money we already gave Public Works?

The obvious answer is NO! They have nothing to show for the money they took from the taxpayers under the repealed Ordinance. It seems to me that Public Works should pay this back to the people with interest not the other way around.

I think this Council owes it to the people of our County to give an account of these funds prior to any “borrowing” from a fund that was to be used for these very projects.
I brought my concerns to the Council but they fell on deaf ears. Council Chair, Howie Rosenfeld declared, “I just don’t understand, why don’t people understand that the money is gone?”

Administrator Pete Rose stated with confidence that we can account for how the funds were spent.

But the money has disappeared. Some may call this business as usual. I call it irresponsible and wasteful. I have heard many excuses for squandering this money but there is really no excuse for it. The people should hold this Council responsible for the money that should have been used for storm water projects and instead was frittered away. We should expect more from our leaders.