As with many towns, the Counties around New Hampshire are also constructing their budgets for the upcoming fiscal year. Here in Belknap, two Republicans (John Thomas and Steve Nedeau) and a Democrat (Ed Philpot) crafted a budget that would raise the County’s portion of the property tax by approximately 9% – this in a time still beset economically with rising taxes at the State level (certainly, the Democrats are already hard at work doing that in Concord), rising taxes at the Federal Level (again, thank you Democrats), and the people looking at their thinning wallets every time they fill up their cars and see how few bags of groceries are bought for $25, $50, or $100 (inflation – the hidden government tax on us all). However, the County Convention (the 18 elected NH House Representatives from all of the districts in Belknap County) has the final authority over that budget – and new Conservative leadership elected to head that Convention (led by the Chair Collete Worseman) reduced that percentage to 0.3%. What did it take?
Simple – Leadership, a “say what you mean, do what you say” attitude. A political courage to go against the grain of those that have no problem in spending other peoples’ money, the rent-seekers called social services that live at the teat of Government and have transformed themselves from being charities to mere outgrowths of that Government (or many as many levels and parts of Government they can latch onto), and the biggest Special Interest of all – Government itself. Sticking to ones guns and Conservative values. A willingness to put themselves between the hard working taxpayers and those that would spend their money by ensuring that essential services would be present – but not extraneous expenditures or “pet ideas”.
Government above people. The Bigger the Government, the smaller the citizen.
Here is the final vote:
The full meeting (chopped into approximately 15 minute chunks each) after the jump. And yes, there were heated words said, for not only has this been about Dollars but also about Power and Political Turf.
Part 1:
Part 2:
Part 3:
Part 4:
Part 5:
Part 6:
