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WHY VOTE FOR SONDRA?
I’m not going to tell you why you shouldn’t vote for the other candidate.
It isn’t my style, and it always oversimplifies the facts.
I will tell you that I have a strong financial background, with an MBA in Finance from Indiana University Kelley School of Business in 1981. I have experience with finance at Cummins and in local small businesses for which I have been an advisor. The County Council makes decisions about the services you receive for your tax dollars. I understand the importance of being good stewards of the limited resources.
We have all been impacted by the price of fuel and the June ‘08 flooding. Our county departments are also strained by these events. It is critical in the coming months and years to rebuild our infrastructure and maintain the level of service our residents expect from local government, and to do so without having to levy new taxes. The status quo will not provide the answer to these serious issues. The situation calls for new, creative approaches.
I will listen to you and hear your concerns. I will bring visibility to the issues and decisions the council makes. I will be responsible to the county taxpayer who entrusts these funds to the Council. I will work hard to balance our financial resources with the health, safety and aesthetics of our beautiful county.
I am particularly interested in the following issues:
- Accountability — The County Council meets monthly to discuss issues brought forth by the many departments that provide our county services, including: Public Health; Education, Highway; Courts; Animal Control; Tax assessment; County Planning; Environmental Health; Sheriff; Soil & Water Conservation; Solid Waste Disposal; School Corporation; Office of Family & Children. Our county tax dollars go to fund these various services. Citizens who want to know how these decisions are made are always welcomed to attend the public meetings to voice their concerns and know what considerations and tradeoffs go into these complex decisions. I believe citizens will get more involved and be better informed if County Council meeting times, agendas and minutes are made more public. I believe we all have a right to this information and a civic duty to get involved when it impacts us. Currently, none of these meetings, Agendas or Minutes are posted on the county website. I will work to make sure the County website is updated with this public information (http://bartholomewco.com/) to help our citizens be informed and their voices be heard.
- Environmental projects to protect the future health and welfare of our county — If we are being good stewards of our natural resources, we are thinking about the impact of our current decisions on the next 7 generations. I believe our current processes discourage thinking much beyond the current year. I will bring discussions of our impact on the water, air and soil for our children and generations to come. I believe clean water will be the next scarce resource if we don’t take it seriously today. I will encourage all departments to assess their impact on the environment and begin projects to conserve and preserve our natural resources. I will encourage us to ready our county to make use of federal and state grants to ensure the future health of Bartholomew County and its citizens.
- Improvement projects to eliminate waste and redundancy in department budgets. The current economy is stretching each of us to find and eliminate waste in our personal finances as well as our businesses. The damage from the June flood has deteriorated our infrastructure of roads, bridges, and wastewater systems. The current price of fuel has increased the costs to operate many of our service departments. These 2 items combined have created a double whammy for Bartholomew County. We must find ways to shift the spending by eliminating waste and redundancy in our county departments. Businesses, like Cummins, have saved millions by using analytical tools to evaluate processes and associated spending. I would like to bring this same discipline to the county offices as an alternative to raising taxes.
I would love to hear your thoughts and ideas. I believe the best ideas come from many people bringing different perspectives to the issues. With a little more involvement, we can make our county government the best in Indiana!
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