From Weekend Pundit (emphasis mine):

Speaking of small town New Hampshire, we are going through out budgeting process for both the town and school. It can be a time-consuming effort, with some wanting a lot more money this coming year and others making do with the same amount they spent this year. One of the biggest parts of the budget for our town is the school system which takes up over 68% of the money the town spends. The town side of the budget has managed to keep spending in check, with most budget increases coming in at approximately 1% or less (this coming year’s is no different). But there have been times when the school side has seen huge increase, both as a percentage and in actual dollars. Of course the reasoning we always hear for those increases are the usual “But it’s for the children!”

It’s funny how all that money “for the children” ends up paying rather high salaries for teachers, supervisory staff, and paraprofessionals. I would say it would be worth it if we had the best schools in the state and out kids performed at the top. However the reality is that our school system is really slightly above average. We spend a lot of money for ‘slightly above average’.

In fact, here’s how “slightly above average” our hamlet really does:

Read more

Cemeteries.  Usually a very small part of any town or city’s budget but it is there.  It seems that every town has at least one within its boundaries; mine, due to historical reasons, has a bunch of them.  Many of them were old family plots started well over a hundred years ago and over time, the town took “ownership” of the land and care of the plots (and yes, if they were and descendants are now among us, I feel they should take care of those plots instead of socializing the costs across the rest of us but this is a beef from my last stint on the BudComm) as well as the “central” one across from our Middle/High Schools).  It’s not much of a budget – a couple of guys to properly take care of the grass and detritus that seemingly collects on the grounds.

And urn vaults….what, URNS VAULTS? Is this a Proper Role of Government? And is this a prime (if tiny) example of mission creep?

Read more

Fake News backfires on ABC as the Russian Collusion Trap Snaps on its first victim.

ABC News announced Saturday that Chief Investigative Correspondent Brian Ross had been suspended for four weeks without pay over a botched “exclusive” about former national security adviser Michael Flynn.

Ross’ suspension is effective immediately. ABC News spokeswoman Heather Riley would not comment on whether anyone else had been suspended in connection with the error.

Meanwhile, over at the FBI division of Mueller-Russia-Find-Something, anything, the shotty “integrity” of the Deep State tries to hide under a rock.

Read more

The NH Democrats held a meeting to discuss their crooked superdelegate mess which was exposed when a candidate, not even in their party, was marginalized by having the superdelegates pledge support for his crooked opponent – before he announced his well-known intention to run as a Democrat.

As if that isn’t “Democrat” enough, there was a futile move to remove the name of a serial abuser of women from the name of their annual banquet. The serial abuser of women is the husband of the Democrat icon who was advanced in the Democrat Primary by the corrupt selection process.

But take heart!

Read more

The US Senate has passed a tax reform package. The Washington Post’s opening paragraph is a predictable spin on the left-wing narrative. Yuge breaks for corporations, a mixed bag for everyone else.

Over at Red State, where they’ve been critical of Trump and this plan (and the Senate) for months, the tone was a bit different.

Read more

The big news for the media and their Democrat allies is that Michael Flynn lied to the FBI about Russia.

The bad news (for the left) is that it doesn’t matter. ABC News, which went yard trying to nail Flynn and Trump to the left’s Russia Collusion secular cross has issued a correction that damn near invalidates the entire collusion narrative they reported above it.

Read more

It’s no secret that Obama and Clinton hate each other. HATE. EACH. OTHER. But party and power mean a lot to the left, so they used each other to get what they wanted. More party. More power.

The Clinton’s have been, more or less, the face of the party since Bill was elected. Hillary’s loss presents an opportunity for change, and we know how much Democrats love change. And we know how much Obama loves change. And the Obama’s would like to see some change.

Read more

With the Left all a twitter about the news of Flynn’s statement of lying to the FBI, never forget that the late US Senator Ted “The Swimmer” Kennedy, that “lion” of the Democrat Senate caucus, actually did connive and collude with Russians (the Communist Soviets at the time) to keep Ronald Reagan from being re-elected as President even as he was thinking about running for the Presidency himself:

Sen. Edward “Ted” Kennedy had “selfish political and ideological motives” when he made secret overtures to the Soviet Union’s spy agency during the Cold War to thwart then-President Ronald Reagan’s re-election, a Reagan biographer said in an interview with The Daily Signal.

Read more

Court Says Two Women Cannot Conceive a Child, Same-Sex Divorcee Shouts ‘Discrimination!’

Again, who says the Left is the side that believes in Science and Reality?

Read more

In a November 29th staff editorial, the Union Leader, while trying to poke New Hampshire’s All Gurl Kongressional Delegation, lent a hand and a good word to No Labels, a left-wing group pretending to be centrist.

None of the four members of New Hampshire’s Congressional delegation has yet joined the Problem Solvers Caucus. There are other ways to work across the aisle. 

But on the big issues of health care and tax reform, New Hampshire’s federal officials have effectively taken their votes off the table. They seem more interested in proving how opposed they are to President Trump than accepting that Republicans should actually get something out of a political compromise.

Reality check. Democrat Congressional “help” only takes the form of making sure Republicans pass things that don’t “fix” anything or that advance Democrat priorities. And oh, by the way, that is what No Labels are all about.

Read more

by Rep. Mike Sylvia

The shell game continues on County Drive. It’s understandable that this sleight of hand would lead to errors in the Laconia Daily Sun’s article covering the Belknap County budget.

Commissioner DeVoy, according to the Sun, said: “…it was poor budget management on the part of the delegation that helped create the current bleak fiscal situation for the county.”

While I’ll agree that ‘poor budget management’ is involved, the fact is the delegation appropriates funds, and the county administration is tasked with budget management. It would be helpful if the administration would keep their spending to monies that had actually been appropriated as opposed to finding ways to spend money which had not been appropriated.

Read more

Each year, the Budget Committee devolves into sub-committees to handle each area or department of both the Town and the School District.  Yesterday was dedicated to three such meetings for me on the School Board budget: Federal Projects, Food Service, and “District Wide” maintenance.

Now those of you that have been reading the ‘Grok for a while know that one of my big bugaboos is the combination of TANSTAAFL and “free money” – the former being “There Ain’t No Such Thing As A Free Lunch” (H/T: Robert Heinlein) and the “free money” really isn’t – somewhere someone is paying state or federal taxes in order for my hamlet to get “free money.”  I dunno about your elected or appointed officials but mine can very seldom put those two concepts together in a cogent fashion.  Actually, TANSTAAFL doesn’t seem to be in their vocabulary but “free money” often is.

Well, our Assistant Superintendent for Business (chief bean counter) Scott Isabelle decided a bit of bamboozling was in order (paraphrasing here):

Of our total budget, we only have to raise X number dollars via taxes as Federal/State grants take care of the rest.

Read more