Polis Politics

Switched at Birth: Paul Ricketts Edition

Former Lawrence Township Assessor/current Lawrence Mayoral Candidate Paul Ricketts and Actor/Director Sir Richard Attenborough:

Congressional Rules may force expensive auto leases

The GOP primary for the 6th District heated up yesterday. Former Marion County Coroner John McGoff, now a candidate in the primary against Congressman Dan Burton, held a press conference yesterday complaining about Burton's use of automobile leases. Burton's office has taxpayer-funded leases for a Cadillac DeVille and Dodge Grand Caravan, combined worth over a thousand dollars per month.

We usually appreciate news organizations checking up on congressional spending on such things (air travel is a personal pet peeve of ours. Thinking these lease prices were a bit high, we did some checking. The Dodge lease seems near market rate (Burton's lease is $406 per month; the advertised lease through Chrysler Financial for a 2008 model is $430.66 per month). The Cadillac lease is not however. Burton's lease is $702 a month, while the advertised lease for a 2008 Cadillac DTS (the DeVille was phased out in 2005) is $439 per month.

We talked to some friends who know how congressional offices run. Supposedly, Congressional rules prohibit down payments on these leases (cash due at signing). As a result, the monthly costs of the lease skyrocket.

We would agree that these leases may be excessive on the taxpayer. Perhaps removing this silly down payment rule could save taxpayers a bunch of money.

Clerk needs to update historical documents as well

Just so Monroe Gray and the rest of City-County Council does not think we are picking on them. We discovered this document on the Clerk's web site, listing the past members of the Elections Board. Our past Clerk, Doris Anne Sadler, is still listed as Clerk and the GOP is still listed as the majority on the Board.

You would figure that after working so hard to take over those offices, Beth White and the Democrats would have purged the GOP from such recognition by now. That is unless they are trying fool some unwitting readers that they (White/Dems) were not responsible for the May Primary Election disaster.

Sheriffs and Constables: The United Bounty Hunters of Indiana

Hat Tip to Advance Indiana for its piece today on County Sheriffs' cuts of unpaid tax collections. According to the piece, County Sheriffs get to pocket 10% of unpaid taxes they collect. Similarly, constables pocket 1% of the worth of the documents they serve.

This system is terribly antiquated and must be reformed. Public servants should not earn a commission for doing what is required of them by law. This may have been necessary in Indiana's primarily agrarian past, but not in 2007. Given the property tax crisis, imagine the tax relief we would see if this pocketed cash was still in government coffers.

Which begs the question, how much did Frank Anderson pocket from unpaid taxes?

Switched at Birth: Greg Ballard Edition

Indianapolis GOP Mayoral Candidate Greg Ballard and Actor/Game Show Personality Paul Lynde:

Will history (May Primary) repeat itself?

There has not been much serious discussion since the May Primary voting debacle of what will be done to fix it. However, the Marion County GOP proposed several elections reforms yesterday to address the issues (online-only Star article here).

Marion County Clerk Beth White, responding to the GOP proposals on WTHR, says she is "cautiously optimistic" that the disaster will not repeat itself this November. However, in our experience, cautiously optimistic is not very optimistic at all.

Well, Bart always wanted to be in the NFL

This site is fairly below the belt, and it's author needs some remedial spelling classes, but it looks like there are more groups opposed to Mayor Peterson than just the taxpayers:

http://www.bartkillsanimals.com

Update: Council History Updated

Last week, we posted on the City-County Council's outdated lists of current and former members. We are glad to report that the Council's web gurus have updated the list, although former Councilor Paula M. Hart Parker has no dates of service listed

Switched at Birth: Tom John Edition

Marion County GOP Chairman Tom John and Actor Dolph Lundgren

Star continues Tax Blame series

There are some Sunday morning traditions in politics. Each network has their newsmaker talk shows. Key columnists write their big columns for Sundays. Here in Indianapolis, we now have a new Sunday tradition: the Indianapolis Star weekly piece on who is to blame for the property tax crisis.

Unfortunately, these pieces are red herrings. Last week's piece blamed folks, specifically churches and non-profits, for being exempt from property taxes. Yesterday, the latest blame was on the DLGF, Indiana's Department of Local Government Finance.

There are some salient points on the issue. Assessors admitted they laid most of the increased property values on residential homeowners. Further, there are some issues with the agency taking on more responsibility with minimal staff adjustments to address the same.

However, in our opinion, the DLGF is thrown under the bus by the Star. They signed off on some shoddy work by local governments, yes, but the Star seems to want to absolve these local entities from blame because of that. If mistakes were made, everyone who made them should be put under scrutiny, not just those higher up on the food chain.

Our great state has an unusual way to finance local government. Governments create budgets, property values are assessed, and the DLGF is responsible for reviewing both and coming up with tax rates. Simply, governments spend, and property owners are taxed to cover the bill.

It would seem to us that if the budgets and spending were less, there would not be a need to raise the property taxes. The Star still searches for answers.