NOV 2nd - PUBLIC HEARING NOTICE

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PUBLIC HEARING NOTICE
RAMSEY COUNTY CHARTER COMMISSION

The Ramsey County Charter Commission is considering an amendment to
the Ramsey County Home Rule Charter. This amendment relates to the
salary of the seven (7) elected County Commissioners.

The tentative amendment being considered is Option A or Option B:

OPTION A:

"Should the Ramsey County Home Rule Charter be amended so that a
salary ordinance increasing Commissioner salaries by more than five
percent (5%) shall be subject to an automatic referendum and shall not
be effective until approved by a majority voting at a referendum?"

OPTION B:

"Should the Ramsey County Home Rule Charter be amended so that any
salary ordinance shall be subject to an automatic referendum and shall
not be effective until approved by a majority voting at a referendum
if: (1) the annual salary will increase more than five percent (5%)
from the preceding years salary; or (2) the annual salary will be more
than seventy percent (70%) of the current salary of a District Court

Judge for the 2nd Judicial District?"

The salary for a Ramsey County Board Member is $82,400 ($84,975 for
the Board Chair) in 2009 and will be the same in 2010 (Ordinance
2008-210 and Resolution 2009-174). The current annual salary for a
District Court Judge for the 2nd Judicial District is $129,124.

The Ramsey County Charter Commission will hold at least one (1) public
hearing to give the public an opportunity to comment on this proposed
amendment and to present any other ideas for the indexing and defining
the compensation of County Commissioners.

The public hearing will be held on Monday, November 2, 2009 at 6:30
p.m. in the Council Chambers, third floor of the Ramsey County Court
House, 15 West Kellogg Boulevard, St. Paul, MN 55102.

After the public hearing, the Ramsey County Charter Commission will
decide whether to place a question on the ballot at the November 2010
general election. The threshold for a ballot question passing is more
than 50% of the Ramsey County voters who vote on the question.

The public can also submit email messages to the Charter Commission at
charteramendment@co.ramsey.mn.us. Letters can be addressed and mailed
to: Ramsey County Charter Commission, 250 Courthouse, 15 West Kellogg
Boulevard, St. Paul, MN 55102 or by calling 651-266-8014.

See the Public Notice

Priorities, Priorities...

The only thing that will be left in this country when these people get done spending all of the taxpayers money will be the poor and the the tracks that we can't afford to run the trains on...

Star Trib Full Story

Ramsey County will take over the Union Depot with the goal of turning it into a regional transit hub by 2012.

The Ramsey County Board, acting as the Regional Rail Authority, on Tuesday approved the purchase of the main building of the Union Depot in downtown St. Paul as part of its quest to turn the area into a regional transit hub.

Commissioners voted 6-0 to pay $8.1 million for the property. Closing is set for Thursday.

The three-story, 188,000-square-foot building, known as the head house, has "good bones" but will need about $350,000 worth of repairs soon, according to a county study. Those would include fixing concrete sidewalk and curb, roof repairs and electrical updates. The county plans to open the building as a transit hub in 2012.

Sheriff wanted a (non-partisan) company for Strike Force audit

Article below By PAUL McENROE, Star Tribune Full Article

Last update: May 24, 2009 - 12:05 AM

Ramsey County Sheriff Bob Fletcher repeatedly tried to prevent a state investigation into the financial operations of the Metro Gang Strike Force, over which his office has fiscal oversight, according to officials directly involved in the state probe that led to the sudden shutdown last week of the unit's activities.

Fletcher's office also did not undertake an in-depth review of how hundreds of thousands of dollars, personal property and vehicles were being accounted for after his office learned last fall that state Department of Public Safety investigators were raising concerns, the officials said.

In a March 3 e-mail to the strike force's advisory board of a dozen local law enforcement officials, a copy of which was obtained by the Star Tribune, Fletcher complained that "it would be a shame" if an audit stemmed from "political motives." He noted in the e-mail that the unit's former commander, Ron Ryan, now under scrutiny for activities on his watch, had an "exemplary" 40-year record of service as a police officer.

Sources also said that Fletcher got into shouting matches with Public Safety Director Michael Campion, complaining that state auditors should not be involved in strike force matters. Fletcher denies those assertions.

But in an interview Friday, Fletcher acknowledged that he had opposed a state audit because he believed it would be based on politics and didn't think it was necessary. He said he would have preferred a private company to perform an audit. He also denied his office was responsible for any oversight of money seized in strike force investigations and instead blamed Ryan, his friend, for mishandling cash and confiscated property.

Fletcher said Friday that he later changed his mind on the need for a state audit, after examiners discovered that the strike force could not account for more than $18,000 cash and at least 13 vehicles....

C.A.F.R. Award Does Not Address Waste, Fraud and Abuse

During the Feb. 3, 2009 Ramsey County Board meeting, Commissioner Jan Parker presented the annual CAFR award (Certificate of Achievement for excellence in Financial Reporting), 34 years running, to the county finance department.

What is not said is that the county and many municipalities around the country are dues paying members of the organization which grants this award, the Government Finance Officers Association (GFOA) located in Chicago.

A quick study of their web page that explains the awards will tell you that the members pay a fee to submit their annual financial reports in hopes of getting an award. A panel of judges comprised of GFOA staff, government employees, accountants and academics evaluate whether your report meets GAAP accounting standards and is readable and understandable. That’s it. It’s not difficult to meet this criteria, and the “awards” are given out to 99% of those members who have paid their entry fees. Just look at how many reports are not given an award — only a handful. (Wouldn’t you like to see those?!)

This is just another example of government trying to fool the public. In fact, some city administrators in Ramsey County have deliberately mislead the public in newspaper stories by saying this award means taxpayer dollars are being spent wisely!

The CAFR “award” is a plaque that is paid for by the taxpayers. Government employees use this to make themselves look like heroes; they benefit when an ignorant public is told they should “feel good” about this while not providing full disclosure.

The GFOA also holds an annual conference for government finance department heads and employees. Taxpayers ought to question what they are getting for this expenditure, which often turns out to be a paid vacation for government finance employees who have been on the job for 20, 30 years. The conference may be valuable to an employee who hasn’t been on the job long, but for a 30-year veteran, it seems hard to believe that the conference would provide great benefit. If it does, the public should be made privy as to what finance veterans glean from these conferences.

Taxpayers ought to question whether conferences and purchasing awards are in their best interests.

Submitted by Bryan Olson

Tax Day Tea Party Event

Today is the day! Join us at the capital along with thousands of Twin Cities residents for the nationwide Tax Day T.E.A. Party - Taxed Enough Already!

• Location: State Capital Steps
  
• Time: 5 PM
• Who: Residents Taxed Enough Already!

There will be music, a tea party skit, several guest speakers and even a "Tea Party Declaration" available for all attendees to sign.

• Event Schedule
• Parking Information
• Carpooling Opportunities
• Suggestions on what to bring to the rally

For more information visit: TeaPartyMN.com


Tea Party T-Shirts

We also have high quality, vintage style T-shirts available for sale:
1 for $20, 2 for $35

Contact me via JimSchottmuller.org if you'd like to purchase one.

County Board Wants More of Your Money to Fund Trains

On Jan 27th Chair Parker described that current state and federal funding levels is insufficient to expand light rail as the board desires. The current plan provides for three (3) light rail lines and two (2) bus lines by 2030 and we can't even afford that. Now the board wants to find more funding sources in our current economic situation so they can build all the light rail lines at once! (Keep in mind there are estimates that put the 11 mile Central Corridor at 1.4 Billion dollars and the state is facing a $7 Billion dollar deficit)

When will our elected officials realize we are all facing dire economic times? When will they start talking about cutting back instead of spending more on these frivolous projects?

Ramsey County Charter Commission Appointments

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Efforts to hold the Ramsey County Board of Commissioners accountable took a leap forward this week! Jim Schottmuller and Rick Moses, both fiscally conservative candidates for commissioner in 2008, have been officially appointed to the Ramsey County Charter Commission. The Ramsey County Charter Commission, also referenced as the "Home Rule Charter", serves as an oversight board defining the duties and responsibilities of Ramsey County government.

You can look forward to discussions defining or amending policy for:

• Term limits
• Board salary increase limits/criteria
• Enhanced financial disclosure
• Improved communication for public meetings

Open government, fiscal responsibility, and unprecedented accountability will be a staple of what we hope to accomplish via the charter commission. Our efforts will focus on shedding light on the "invisible layer of government."

I encourage your feedback and suggestions for improving Ramsey County government.

CONTACT INFO:
Jim Schottmuller
Ramsey County Charter Commissioner - District 1
Jim@JimSchottmuller.org
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The Loss of Dennis Newinski

Full Story

"Newinski won a seat in the Minnesota House in 1990 and nearly made his way to Washington, D.C., in 1994 as a representative from the state's Fourth Congressional District. That year he nearly beat incumbent Bruce Vento in a district that had long been held by Democrats."

I had the opportunity to meet Dennis this past year. He was a very kind and knowledgeable man. Ramsey County has lost a wonderful and selfless individual.

My sympathy to his family and friends in this difficult time.

The Stimulus Stampede

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

-- H. L. Mencken

Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.

-- Also Mencken

Are you getting an uneasy feeling about this whole stimulus thing? I am.

It really feels like we're being stampeded. The rhetoric has been apocalyptic. Consider this reasoned, measured statement that President Obama made during yesterday's presser:

My administration inherited a deficit of over $1 trillion, but because we also inherited the most profound economic emergency since the Great Depression, doing a little or nothing at all will result in even greater deficits, even greater job loss, even greater loss of income, and even greater loss of confidence. Those are deficits that could turn a crisis into a catastrophe.

This is a long way from FDR's "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself." The only thing that's truly on offer is fear itself. This is stupid. The sky will not fall if this stimulus package does not pass. But we won't find out, because it's going to pass in some form or another.

So what are we likely to get from the stimulus package? And are we going to get it good and hard? Who knows? It's so huge, so full of stuff that it's impossible to wrap your mind around it. One site that is helpful is Stimulus Watch, a site that provides, among other things, a look at some of the "shovel ready" projects that are bidding fair to get some of the gigantic honey pot that's coming down Pennsylvania Avenue.

Minnesota has some projects in mind. For those of us in northern Ramsey County, this is exciting news. Let's consider a couple of worthy endeavors that are out there.

The first is from Roseville, which asks for $1.5 million to replace the clubhouse and maintenance shop at a golf course, which I presume would be Cedarholm. Cedarholm is a cute little executive course that sits near Highway 36 and Hamline Avenue, about a quarter-mile east of Rosedale Mall. It has lost money for years. I don't doubt for a moment that a new clubhouse would help make it a more pleasant amenity, but there's no way that the money will change the underlying economics of the site: it is a pitch and putt course and simply selling the land would yield far more money and economic development for Roseville and Ramsey County. But there's a chance that the folks in Elkhart, Indiana will be helping us to pay for this.

Meanwhile, in lovely Arden Hills, there's an idea to plunk down $40 million to get the long-moribund TCAAP site up and running. TCAAP is the Twin Cities Army Ammunition Plant, which is about as Superfund a Superfund site as you can imagine. There are unbelievable amounts of toxins buried out there and it's highly unlikely that $40 million would even begin to handle all the potential cost of abatement, especially since the new administration will be a lot less likely to be benevolent with developers. Arden Hills is a very nice, generally upscale suburb with an excellent location close to both Minneapolis and St. Paul, and while one could imagine a potential market for varying development in the area, the experience of New Brighton's disastrous Northwest Quadrant project makes me question where the interest would be in such a project. The Northwest Quadrant area had less environmental problems than TCAAP and is even closer to Minneapolis than the TCAAP parcel, but it has failed to come anywhere close to the rosy projections that the local goverment worthies came up with. Our friend Right Hook wrote an excellent synopsis of what happened with the Northwest Quadrant. It's a pathetic tale of local politicians pretending to be developers without understanding the fundamentals of what makes a project work. Perhaps it's possible that the majordomos in Arden Hills might do a better job of shepherding a successful project that sits less than a mile east of the Northwest Quadrant, but that's not the way to bet. And in any event, it's not clear why federal money would be warranted for a project that's been out there for over a decade and hasn't moved off the dime.

There are literally thousands of other projects out there. Some might be more worthy than these ones. But I'd be willing to wager that most of them aren't. And riddle me this: do you think that the laid off IT guys and Circuit City sales people have the skill set to be "shovel ready" and work on public works projects of this sort? It's a question that hardly anyone seems to be asking while we are stampeded into this brave new world that President Obama demands.

Cross-posted at Mr. Dilettante

How Convenient. Pay Can't Be Frozen...

A legal frost on pay freeze?

Some city and county officials are OK with cuts or freezes, but state law prevents the action mid-term.

By STEVE BRANDT, Star Tribune Full story

Despite Gov. Tim Pawlenty's call for a local government salary freeze, there's one pay raise that city councils and some county boards can't undo right now -- their own.

State law prohibits it.

City councils and the Hennepin County Board are barred from raising or lowering their pay rates in mid-term. They'd have to wait until after the next elections for a salary cut to take effect.

... Despite the law, the Hennepin County Board plans to vote on freezing next year's pay at this year's level, forgoing a scheduled pay increase it approved last year before the election.

...Ramsey County commissioners approved a 3 percent increase to $82,400 for 2009 (over and above the 25% increase that went into effect Jan 1, 2008.) They haven't discussed publicly any possible changes.