Why I will vote against Fire District request
To the editor:
They have demonstrated that they don’t know how to manage money. Let me explain by using my budget. I get an income. The amount may, or may not be, what I want, what I need or not go up every year. In fact, when times get tough, it may even go down. But, this is my income and what I have to work with.
Now to expenditures, I have always made a point to pay myself first in order to provide for long-range items (retirement, emergencies, a future large expenditure, etc.). Only after setting that aside do I address how I am going to spend this disposable part of my income. I then allocate funds to housing, food, insurance, clothing, medical, transportation, vacations, etc. Trying to pay for everything I want is oftentimes maddening, and insufficient, but there is no other recourse. Sometimes I may elect not to spend a budgeted item, but save it for next year. When the next year arrives, I have twice as much to spend for the item. I suspect this is how generally most of us deal with money. It gives us funds to cover unknown expenses, make sizable acquisitions, feel comfortable that we are making headway on retirement savings, etc. It enables us to avoid getting “between a rock and a hard place.” This is how budgeting is intended to work. It is called “living within your means.” It forces one to make the hard decisions now, and not defer them to some future period. Even firemen have to do it, because they, like me, don’t control their income, only their expenditures.
And now let’s turn our attention to the “Fire District.” I will paraphrase Chief Marzella when he said that “when the economy turned south, we had to reach into reserves to cover our expenditures. Those reserves are now almost depleted. We have lots of stuff we ‘need’ to buy to meet current obligations, so we are now asking you, the community, to help us by increasing our income.” Just 25 percent mind you.
From my perspective, the Fire District doesn’t know how to budget, and worse yet, manage it. If any one of us that did what they did, we would find ourselves in a really deep hole. This is like me coming to the community saying: instead of saving for my retirement, I spent it on other really important things, and now can somebody take care of me.
Chief Marzella, are you suggesting that I should go into my reserves, or one of my budgeted items? Is that not what should be done at the Fire District?
Bob Foco
St. James City