The news world is a little slow on this holiday weekend so here is a roundup of some stories from earlier in the week.
Congressman Joe Donnelly announced his bid for re-election.
In yet another of the ever growing list of reasons why the lease of the Indiana Toll Road was a bad idea, there is now a possibility of a toll worker strike.
East Chicago and Lake County governments, with what can be considered to have some of the most bloated employee payrolls in Northwest Indiana, are considering layoffs to deal with funding cuts from the state. It will be very interesting to see what effect the layoffs, if enacted, will have on the upcoming election although Lake County officials have proven that they can be pretty creative with their patronage systems.
In a bit of labor news that I found very interesting, the United Steel Workers are considering a merger with Unite the Union, a large labor union representing workers in the United Kingdom and Ireland. With the spread of corporate globalization, it was just a matter of time before workers began to consider globalization.
Sunday, July 6, 2008
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Comment, in 200 words or less, that the Times will not post. For some reason my comments rarely get posted.
"When George Pabey came into office many like myself organized to help the new Mayor pick-up the pieces and move this city forward. We met weekly under the authority of the "Mayor's Economic Development Task Force." These meetings included leaders from Industry (Mittal, BP, Praxair, Safety-Kleen, and the Forum), local and regional authorities (City Department, NIRCP).
We held discussions on the challenges the City faced: Bloated City Budget & Taxes, Blighted Housing & Downtown, The need to attract new businesses, Address Environmental issues, and a Comprehensive Plan.
Several positive solutions came out of these meetings. One such solution came from an Industrial leader who offered to finance a program to transfer city employees from the public sector to the private. This was a best-case scenario for city workers to maintain employment and property owners to address Taxing issues. In response, the Mayor and Charlie Pecura often repeated that there was no need for such a program because the Governor was going to step-in to increase taxes on industry again. Thus, the Mayor gave BP $165 million tax abatement and prior to the election went on a hiring spree. Now the Mayor stands defiant against cutting the budget."
The Mayor was well informed about the budget and payroll problems. He knew what had to be done the day he took office. He choose to neglect the problem and focus on controlling contracts. By the way, Charlie's employment numbers are arguably much higher. Shame on Joe Carlson for accepting them from Charlie at face value.
In the early days of Pabey's administration many good people stepped forward to help only to realize that Pabey was no better than the last administration.
If I could advise Federal Prosecutors, it would be that it is more important to stop the present regime of public corruption than to prosecute the last. East Chicago will never get on its feet if we continue to allow these activities to occur.
As in the past, East Chicago chickens again voted for Col. Sanders.
It's easy to understand why East Chicago Chicken's voted for Col. Sanders. They are on his payroll - he feeds them before he kills them.
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