Kansas GOP Insider (wannabe): Olathe, dumber than I thought

Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Olathe, dumber than I thought

Welp. It appears the citizens of Olathe are dumber than I thought. 

According to unofficial results, Olathe voters opted to support a sales tax increase to fund road improvements. How vapid and uninspiring.

Here's the deal, local governments should fund road improvements and maintenance through it's general fund and existing budget. Road maintenance should already be built into the tax equation, and new growth and development should fund new roads. If Olathe isn't funding road maintenance with its existing property taxes, sales taxes, share of gasoline taxes, what are they doing at city hall? Olathe property values increased last year -- meaning more tax revenue without having to increase rates. Meanwhile, sales taxes were also up. Not to mention, Olathe is a growing community, which means crazy collection of development fees. Again, where are they wasting money at Olathe City Hall? Because it's obvious they're doing something wrong if they have all of those revenue "enhancements" and still need more.

Maintaining roads is a very basic responsibility of city government. Almost everything else is an extra.

I also balk at the suggestion that "outsiders" pay sales taxes, which is why the sudden push for sales taxes in general. 

One blogger, JoCo SOB, continually makes fun of the Olathe ghetto. And I used to wonder why the blogger thought Olatheans were so, so daft. Apparently, the citizens are dumber than the citizens of KCMO. 

Olathe's willingness to increase taxes FOR NO MEANINGFUL REASON leads me to believe the city is in a downward spiral. It's only a matter of time before they hit rock bottom. With voters that dumb, residents should prepare for worsening schools, dramatically increased crime, corrupt politicians. 

2 comments:

  1. Here's the fundamental issue why these things pass:

    It's not that the voters are dumb, it's just that they don't actually follow local government that closely. So, when city leaders, those charged with monitoring the government, come out and say "we need taxes for our roads", the voters tend to say "okay, sure."

    So, I would actually say that the fact 43% voted no -- despite the only real opposition being a phone call campaign -- is a good sign. If there had been a real campaign against it -- signs, literature drops, etc -- it would have gone down in flames.

    The problem is that these types of issues rarely generate organized opposition, because such efforts take a lot of time and money and people to organize, and these things often occur in these "shot gun" type of elections that come out of nowhere.

    In my view, that's a shame as I think some nicely done signs and a mailing would have killed it. Oh, well...

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  2. I agree with you whole-heartedly anonymous. These fly-by-night electoral cash grabs are a problem, because it's true: Almost no one pays attention to local politics.

    Perhaps most disheartening about the Olathe tax increase is that other municipalities are now going to follow suit. I look for a slew of cities to try to raise sales taxes, because Olathe was successful in bamboozling its citizens.

    I'm also very discouraged that the Olathe council, filled with so-called conservatives, including Ron Ryckman and Larry Campbell, agreed to this sham. Shame on them. Their actions will reverberate throughout the state with other cities following suit. The next time either of them complains about too much spending at any level, they should be laughed off the stage.

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