by: Diane Benjamin
According to the City mouthpiece, Bloomington will double the local gas tax to $.08 for every gallon: https://www.pantagraph.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/road-weary-city-officials-eye-doubling-local-motor-fuel-tax/article_258321e6-928b-57d7-a1c0-ad250fb8e18b.html#tracking-source=home-breaking
Another prediction: Somebody will say it’s only a few bucks.
Quote:
Here is what the mouthpiece forgot to add to the story:
The $.04 a gallon Motor Fuel Tax was passed in 2014. The Sales Tax was increases 1% in 2015.
What that means is: The ONLY money spent on roads comes from taxes that were increased.
Now remember water, garbage, sewer, and storm water rates have all been raised so the “enterprise” funds balance. (Another joke on taxpayers) Don’t forget Liquor License Fees and Video gaming income. Where is that money going. Likely their “pot”
Where is all the rest of the money you pay in taxes?
Prior to all the tax increases all of the above was paid out of taxes citizens already paid. Obviously raising taxes accomplishes nothing – they just spend more! (See State of Illinois – same idiots running it too)
Citizens are now taxed more so that money is freed up for whatever the City wants to spend it on!
Employees have received raises far in excess of most citizens. Employees can still spike their pensions – at your expense. Employees still have gold-plated insurance. Coliseum still sucks money. BCPA still sucks money. Creativity Center is sucking money now and plans are to make it even worse. Don’t forget the sports complex and new pool.
It gets worse – they have no intention of spending all the money raised on fixing the roads:
They are fixated on the downtown that failed decades ago and only continues to get worse as more businesses leave.
Bloomington needs a yellow (orange is easier) vest protest Monday night! How long are the citizens going to take this abuse? Stay home and be good sheep and be led to slaughter!
Does anybody know there is an election on April 2nd? Early voting has begun with hardly a peep from the media.
I refuse to drive
Hershey Road
until it is fixed!
(Hope you don’t own a business there)
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They’ve been throwing asphalt all week on Hershey but it’s still a minefield.
No one will know there is an election so few will vote. Republicans and independents had better go to each person and get them to the ballot box or we will never get out of this mess created by ourselves for not voting these jackxxxasses out.
Perhaps we need to inundate their app with pothole requests!
Great plan!
It’s really too bad there ISN’T a tax on bureaucracy, stupidity and waste, as we’d be living in the richest state in the union. Even Alaskans with their “permanent Fund” would envy us! SAD, but THEY even have BETTER roads!
We’re ready to move. Just figuring out where to go.
Great article Diane
I thought Karch stated he needed $9 million annually to start getting the roads all fixed up. Definitely more bovine excrement from the Renner/Gleason regime.
That was to get them up to poor!
Can anybody plainly tell me what is ‘the fair amount’ is? Is there an upper limit? If so, please tell me where it is.
Will anyone say ‘Oh no…the good citizens have suffered too much as it is because we told them it was necessary. We’ve taxed them too much for too long already’? Or maybe even ‘Oh no…this is a line we dare not cross. This is too far’. (draws big red line for effect)
No, of course they won’t. That’s because government officials are nothing but petty criminals by any other name. Everything they do is immoral. It’s very existence necessitates that something must be taken from the individual or their property ‘for the good of society’. If this were actually true, I wouldn’t be an Anarch.
The ‘revenue’ they speak of is stolen money. They get in between two consenting parties conducting a transaction (labor for wages, money for goods, etc) and help themselves to a ‘;fair’ cut of something they didn’t have anything to do with in the first place. Every dime they spend is stolen in this fashion. You know else who does this?
Criminals.
What exactly does the city do to enhance the electricity coming into my house; the gas, or the phone? NOTHING! The city has no meaningful oversight power over any utility we use, so what exactly are we paying for? NOTHING!
In this particular instance regarding an increase in the gasoline tax, there is not one person around the horseshoe who can say with a straight face ‘You are paying this tax because the city provides the most exquisite roads in Illinois’ – NOT A ONE. We ‘consented’, I guess, to an increase ONLY four years ago because we were told it was necessary BUT it would solve ‘the problem’ once and for all.
The city reduced the bulk waste pick ups from a bi-weekly schedule to a bi-annual one to pull more resources into solving ‘the problem’. More money should have been available for ‘the problem’. Sanitation taxes were increased and services were reduced – a sacrifice the citizens made, albeit begrudgingly for ‘the problem’. Utility taxes were raised for three different services to solve ‘the problem’.
Those pesky ‘problems’.
Obviously none of these many, many ‘solutions’ have been to any avail against ‘the problem’ – to perform what can only be described as a basic governmental function – to build and maintain ‘muh roads’ (This is a joke among Anarchs…the first question a statist usually asks is ‘well..who’s gonna build muh roads huh?’).
Given the horrid conditions of our streets, I can only say ‘You call this shit a road? Feels like I’m driving in the Yucca Flat nuclear test grounds in Nevada!’
The very notion that government organizes itself for the benefit of citizens is absurd in the extreme. How can government benefit the citizens when it’s very first act is to steal from them. A fine current example is the talk from Springfield regarding the taxation of marijuana and gambling. ‘lawmakers’ aren’t talking about making an investment in marijuana growing and distribution operations, are they? No. ‘lawmakers’ aren’t investing in the expansion of gambling in the state of Illinois, are they? No, of course not. All they’re trying to do is figure out what ‘cut’ the government will get for simply ALLOWING it. Those fools are so giddy, they think they’re going to make a dent in ‘the pension problem’ – like mob bosses planning their winter in Boca Raton or something. Ridiculous!
Another fine example. The ‘progressive’ income tax. Nothing but government greed codified. A pity I can’t convince anybody that it will fail. A quick question for advocates(statist) of such nonsense. If 1% is responsible for half of the taxes you steal, what happens when half of that 1% move away? Answer: You will only be stealing 75% as much as you used to. I know ‘mafs’ is hard, but it seems to me that this might make the problem even worse than it is right now.
One more time. Think real hard…75% IS less than 100%. Right? That’s bad…this is Bad, right?
Back to more local affairs. I anticipate our very own twice rebuked princeling of the prairie, ‘Triple Taxin’ Tari’, will claim (with…a straight face) that this is ‘the hard choice’. There’s nothing hard about this. It is a vote. It will pass without as much as a whimper of protest (or is there someone with any measure…ANY MEASURE of fiscal discipline to be found anywhere on the horseshoe that I don’t know about? Didn’t think so).
Oh. Citizens of Normal…you’re next. You will pay more for gasoline because of the city of Bloomington’s blunderous and buffoonish mismanagement of it’s affairs. And no…your council will not allow you to have a four cent competitive advantage in gasoline prices…silly people.
You are next!
Cheers! from the resident Anarch
Well said. You do get police and fire protection but little else of value from all the taxes.
But what good is police if it doesn’t include protection from criminals (illegal aliens)?
There are interesting ideas regarding both – usually involving insurance companies.
In an unregulated free market environment, insurance companies would have no choice but to be as competitive as possible when assessing and pricing their risks. Transparency would be a given if you wanted anyone to believe you had the wherewithal to successfully pay any claim. It would be the insurance companies who would form fire protection units. Their interest is in making sure that damage is minimized as much as possible. It would be efficient and cost effective. There are other ideas about police protection as well…all done without a monopoly on violence and coercion.
Also, looking through that horrible waste of ink and paper called the Pantagraph, mostly all I see the police doing is processing drug crimes or violence related to drug distribution operations.
Government enforced prohibitions usually do this – enhance the criminal element by creating a lucrative market for those prohibited goods. Without these prohibitions, crime would drop to near nothing – not because you did away with a law that made someone a criminal, but because you took away what made drugs such a lucrative commodity – scarcity. Naturally, to control ‘the drug problem’, the state must hire and inordinate number of people to control ‘the problem’ they created. It mystifies me how nobody can see this. All this government – trillions of dollars fighting ‘the drug war’ – and yet drugs are still a scourge and plague upon the land. It is nothing but a multi-billion dollar a year racket with many invested stakeholders who have used government for their own benefit. Criminals LOVE government – until they get caught.
Personally, I don’t advocate people using drugs. They make you stupid and lazy. Having said this, I am not arrogant enough to tell someone how to live their life – it is a free country after all.
The point I want to make is that we need to start thinking outside of government for solutions. I say this as society has seemingly (they would have us believe) lurched leftward to more government schemes for solving ‘problems’ being put forward by people who call themselves ‘progressives’ or ‘democratic socialists’ (a ludicrous term that defies definition). Government is not the solution to ‘the problem’. It IS the problem.
Obviously nothing I am advocating here will ever see the light of day in this state, or world for that matter – not in a thousand generations.
We aren’t nearly evolved enough to handle it – far too much personal responsibility required.
Thank you for letting me air out these few thoughts on your forum. Hoping you’re doing better (Andy as well). Peace be with you.
Your gas tax money will not be used for road repair . It will be used to build King Tari’s hotel that no one wants.
He’s off the hotel kick. It will likely be used to buy empty downtown properties
I dont think so. Taxing Tari has always wanted that hotel. He may use the money to buy property but the hotel is still alive and well in his warped universe . The SF building is till for sale at a “mere” what 94 million? Perfect location for a hotel and of course there’s the Disconnect transit station.
I saw this in the wastepaper, Novel idea? Have a weekly Favorite Pothole Contest. Contestants would safely measure the depth, width and length of each pothole they want to enter, along with a clear photo of each and the address or it. That Wards Council’s person should be pictured along side of it. Then BLN could pick the winner each week, and show it and the name the Ward that it is in and show a photo of that wards council person. All winning entries could still be rejudged the following week if they are not filled.
While not knowing about the legality of doing this, it has be proven several times that embarrassment to the Ward person will get faster results.
Personally I think the title tells it all. City of Bloomington closely followed by Normal is being ran by jacka$$es.
Honestly if I lived within the city limits I’d run against the loser of a mayor of Bloomington. The only way to put a stop to this irresponsible fiscal theft is to vote the mayor out and city council and replace them by conservatives and then drain the swamp at city hall starting with the city manager and on down. They would be scurrying like rats on a sinking ship.
The less I buy in Bloomington/Normal the better I like it. The less tax revenue from me the better.
Maybe the next time I see the mayor at Barnes and Noble or Schnucks I’ll call him out for what he is. What’s he going to do….. nothing!
If he doesn’t call the police he will call you uniformed and walk away.
“The less I buy in Bloomington/Normal the better I like it. The less tax revenue from me the better.”
3 Thumbs Up!!! Been saying this for years.
“Maybe the next time I see the mayor at Barnes and Noble or Schnucks I’ll call him out for what he is. What’s he going to do….. nothing!”
4 Thumbs Up!!!! Hopefully……he’ll “lose it” and create a deliciously justifiable self defense situation.