You can find it
here.
A fairly one-sided article. It would have been nice if some of the attendees were interviewed. That would have involved some actual reporting and more time on the part of MLMN. It is to be expected that BAWG Chair Tom Colman and Township Manager Mimi Gleason would give a flowery impression of things.
In fact, the budget is not really balanced. Apparently, 10% of the anticipated transfer tax from large commercial sales (from the General Reserve Fund) for use in the operating budget is how the budget "appears" to be balanced. In a nutshell, it is
fund accounting manipulation. Any way you look at, the reserves are being eroded.
It would have been helpful if Colman had commented on report items the township HAS NOT enacted - such as cutting the longevity bonus system. It would have demonstrated a level of independence. The BAWG report is fairly clear in its advice on that line item in that it should be cut. There is not much explanation for the advice as it needs none. Regardless of economic client, such non-merit based compensation is entirely inappropriate in a taxpayer funded setting.
When you juxtapose the fact that the longevity bonuses are still in place with the fact that $30K is still in the budget for fireworks and the fact that that fire service was cut by $100K and the library budget was slashed by approx $200K, you have to wonder what the real the priorities are.
Clearly, one of the priorities is to facilitate a $50K backroom deal with the St. David's Golf Club so that the club could be alleviated of its sidewalk obligations under its approved development plan. Hence why I have called for
Kampf, Lamina and Olson to resign.
There is no priority of some sort of long term vision. It would have been helpful if the BAWG Report had scenario-based recommendations. For example, the EIT was dismissed out of hand - with no significant mention of the fact that $3M is currently being paid by residents and that those $'s would come back to Tredyffrin if we had an EIT. There was no mention of the fact that in reality, we subsidize neighboring townships for the benefit of those citizens - at the expense of us - the Tredyffrin Citizens. In fact, other municipalities thank us for our stance!
There is no other way to describe the BAWG's treatment of the EIT question as results-oriented intellectual dishonesty. The very fact that the BAWG would thinly suggest a flat business tax - but not consider the EIT - makes no sense whatsoever. To date, no official, candidate, staff member or BAWG Member has cited an intellectually defensible reason for why an EIT shouldn't be enacted, much less even considered. About all we get are political soundbytes. Keep in mind, this is the same group that thinks nothing of raising our real estate taxes! There is simply no logic or reason to the process.
About all the BAWG report suggests are cuts. Indeed, there are general ideas such as "Recheck all Math" and "Implement a Strategic Plan". Both are good ideas, but quite frankly, I am surprised that they had to be suggested in the first place. No wonder things are were they are. We have a 100+ person government with an annual $35 Million budget that does not operate under nor have a strategic plan. I don't know of many successful businesses of comparable size that do not have a strategic plan. I know of many smaller entities that do have a strategic plan.
