I was wondering, what would the City of Albany do if they won the lottery? I mean, since so many are enamored with how they haven’t raised taxes despite not doing a blasted thing to try and cut spending, I thought it might be an interesting idea to see what the City would do with a winning lottery ticket. After all, they’re fiscally responsible, right?
The current Mega Millions jackpot is $17 million, so let’s use that as our basis. Since they’re a governmental body, they don’t pay income taxes, so they would actually get to keep the whole amount, where as you and I wouldn’t. Yeah, they suck. So what would the City of Albany do with $17 million?
Well, to start with, they might add some more security cameras to their surveillance arsenal. I mean, what’s privacy to lottery winners? Of course, we know that our privacy isn’t really threatened, because no one’s actually <em>watching</em> the blooming things, but that’s beside the point. We could have all kinds of cameras everywhere. Heck, we could even give London a run on number of cameras per capita! How about that!
Or maybe they could be a few more Super Segways! Yeah, then our officers could diddy bop around Albany…except that no one I know has really even seen one of these things on patrol. In fact, they weren’t bought for patroling, just for special events or something, but why not have a few more? I mean, just because they don’t use the things doesn’t mean there’s a good excuse not to buy them, right?
But the really awesome thing is that with $17 million, the City Commission could buy a whole lot seats on the Economic Development Commission! I mean, with Water Gas & Light having just bought their seat (what the heck does WG&L need with a seat on the EDC anyways) indicates that we should all be able to buy our seats!
Yeah, then the EDC will be crowded as hell and won’t actually get anything done, but take a look around Albany. Does it really look like they’ve gotten anything done yet? No? So then, what’s the harm with the City loading up the EDC?
Frankly, with their fiscal track record, that would actually be one of their smarter investments. Then, they can put all their friends on one mailing list rather than scattered all over the place. Albany has always seemed to run on the “good old boy” system, and this would be a heck of a way to keep up that time honored tradition!
So what do you say City of Albany? Do you feel lucky?
I don’t know what the City would do with lottery winnings but I do think “buying” a seat on any board is a little suspect. First, the $100K is still taxpayer money. Having it come from WG&L may make some folks think it isn’t but it is. Second, if the EDC board thought WG&L should have a seat why not just make one available. With the City Manager already a board member adding a seat for WG&L effectively gives the Mayor 2 votes on the EDC doesn’t it. I would like to see a lot more private sector participation on the EDC and a diminished role for government.
BTW: You mentioned several questionable expenditures but left out the new 311 phone service. It has to be near the top of any questionable list.
Some who work for the city are indicating that the 311 has actually freed up various office staff to actually do the job they were hired to do rather than answer phone calls from people to stupid or lazy to use a phone book, which is why it wasn’t mentioned. I’m not in favor of the system at all, but I’m reserving comment for the time being to see if this continues to be the case. If so, it could argued to actually increase efficiency among the various local government agencies.
We’ll see what the verdict will be though
The city, and now these subdivisions, have become so bureaucratized. Some of the staff and pols want to run all aspects of the city and related projects and seemingly squeeze out or contain the private sector or use them as they see fit.
Maybe, in the end, the city can do a good job in some areas, but is there any room left for new private sector leaders to step in?
I find the mayor’s proposal very odd. It struck me as a knee-jerk response to some of the negative press he was getting about economic development. Has he explained his reasoning? Is this like endowing a university chair? Does the EDC really need more taxpayer money? For what ends?
What’s to do?
Tom,
I can promise you the 311 system will be hailed as an efficiency success (as judged by those who built it). But the point isn’t efficiency. We have shrinking revenues and we’re adding services that no one asked for much like the examples you mentioned. We’re running advertisements to promote use of the service I hope we’re getting the airtime free. Of course you can only call during business hours. “Need a pot hole fixed, call 311”………. my foot.