The article concerning the Lewis County budget was extremely concerning.
Let me start by saying the function of government is to provide essential services that cannot be effectively provided by citizens, neighborhoods or lower-level government. In recent years, particularly since FDR was president, government has mushroomed in scope. More and more services are being offered by the government than is really necessary.
The core function of government, public safety, is being moved more and more into “side taxes,” or assessments and levies, such as the “public safety tax” Commissioner Sean Swope spoke of. Some fire services and personnel are being financed by special levies. This is absolutely unacceptable. Those core services, police, fire and EMT, should be the very first items on the budget, not funded by special assessments.
Everything else should come after.
Want to cut the budget? Start by cutting some of those extras that seem to get tacked on. The state is especially good at this. Whenever there’s a surplus forecast, they add on items and programs, or expand programs, rather than returning some of that hard-earned money the taxpayers send to them.
I think the concept of government has become too all-inclusive. Remember, the Constitution says in the 10th Amendment, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
There are a lot of programs that are extremely questionable.
Bruce Peterson
Centralia
