Here are my reasons for opposing the “CDBG Interlocal Cooperation Agreement with Utah County” (For more information see http://www.hud.gov/offices/cpd/communitydevelopment/programs/).

Earmarks in congress corrupt the appropriations process.  The same is true for local projects that we get someone else to pay for.  Each project should stand on its own merits not whether or not we can get “free” money from the Feds to pay for it.  The real value of projects is obscured when the Feds tax people in Alpine to pay for manure management research in Ames, Iowa (http://www.cagw.org/reports/pig-book/2009/oinkers.html), tattoo removal in California, energy efficient street lamps in Detroit, Michigan or a “Bridge to Nowhere” in Alaska.  If manure management is important then the people in Ames can pay for it.  And we should not be asking the people in Iowa, California, Michigan, and Alaska to pay for our curb and gutter.  (This doesn’t even take into account the massive bureaucratic overhead costs inherent in moving money all the way to D.C. and then back out to the communities.) If it is important for Alpine then we can pay for it ourselves.

Last night I didn’t vote against curb and gutter on 800 South, which was the impression that some got.  I didn’t even know that this money was earmarked for that project.  I didn’t find out until after the meeting was over.  But it wouldn’t have mattered.  I would still have voted against looking for a hand out from the Federal Government.  I plan on getting the curb and gutter into our budget without asking the U.S. taxpayer, or current or future, to pay for it. It’s time for every city, county and state to do the same.

Alpine ‘torn’ over basketball tax

http://www.heraldextra.com/news/local/north/alpine/article_de9ae0da-286d-5150-b3cd-3a493b30e377.html

“I have a hard time with subsidies,” said Councilman Brad Reneer. “The city doesn’t subsidize piano lessons or dance lessons. I don’t feel I have the right to have the citizens of Alpine pay for my son” to play basketball.

It is hard for me to justify any kind of subsidies, even when I benefit monetarily from them.  I think parks and recreation is a legitimate function of local government but the “recreation” part needs some strict limits.  I just felt that this went beyond what is justifiable and, besides, we just can’t afford it right now.

Some good articles about subsidies:

Rolling Back Government: Lessons from New Zealand by Maurice P. McTigue

Then we asked the final question: “Who should be paying—the taxpayer, the user, the consumer, or the industry?” We asked this because, in many instances, the taxpayers were subsidizing things that did not benefit them. And if you take the cost of services away from actual consumers and users, you promote overuse and devalue whatever it is that you’re doing.

Future Prospects for Economic Liberty by Walter Williams

Again, the primary justification for increasing the size and scale of government at the expense of liberty is that government can achieve what it perceives as good. But government has no resources of its own with which to do so. Congressmen and senators don’t reach into their own pockets to pay for a government program. They reach into yours and mine. . . .

Speaking of the ballot box, we can blame politicians to some extent for the trampling of our liberty. But the bulk of the blame lies with us voters, because politicians are often doing what we elect them to do. The sad truth is that we elect them for the specific purpose of taking the property of other Americans and giving it to us. Many manufacturers think that the government owes them a protective tariff to keep out foreign goods, resulting in artificially higher prices for consumers. Many farmers think the government owes them a crop subsidy, which raises the price of food. Organized labor thinks government should protect their jobs from non-union competition. And so on. We could even consider many college professors, who love to secure government grants to study poverty and then meet at hotels in Miami during the winter to talk about poor people. All of these—and hundreds of other similar demands on government that I could cite—represent involuntary exchanges and diminish our freedom.

This reminds me of a lunch I had a number of years ago with my friend Jesse Helms, the late Senator from North Carolina. He knew that I was critical of farm subsidies, and he said he agreed with me 100 percent. But he wondered how a Senator from North Carolina could possibly vote against them. If he did so, his fellow North Carolinians would dump him and elect somebody worse in his place. And I remember wondering at the time if it is reasonable to ask a politician to commit political suicide for the sake of principle. The fact is that it’s unreasonable of us to expect even principled politicians to vote against things like crop subsidies and stand up for the Constitution. This presents us with a challenge. It’s up to us to ensure that it’s in our representatives’ interest to stand up for constitutional government.

Another candidate states:

I am the only candidate who has voted consistently against a major development on the northwest hills, which includes 60 foot retaining walls.  Three other candidates have voted in favor of retaining walls terracing up our mountainside, claiming that the ordinance allows it”.  (emphasis in the original flyer)

What do you think of when someone says “60 foot retaining walls?”   Do you think of one huge wall with 60 vertical feet?  Or do you think of the actual plan from the developer of terraced steps up a hillside?  This candidate’s statement makes it sound like everyone else is in favor of  retaining walls like you find in Provo Canyon.

The terraced walls were allowed by the city ordinances under which the developer applied.  The  job of the planning commission is not “legislate from the bench.”  The planning commission is instructed to compare the developer’s application to the ordinance and Utah state law.  From the city ordinance governing the Planning Commission:

If the Final Plat and all supplementary data complies with the applicable requirements of these regulations and the requirements of the approved Preliminary Design Plan, the Planning Commission shall certify approval of the Plat on the space provided.

The candidate’s claim is at best over dramatic; at worst it is misleading.

For more on the subject see Vista Meadows – Role of the Planning Commission in considering applications.

Here is the letter I sent to one of the residents about this issue.  One of the other candidates says that I’m “in favor of retaining walls.”  I’d say that I’m in favor of obeying state law and Alpine’s ordinances.

Thanks for sharing your perspective.  I hope we can respectfully agree to disagree where our perspectives diverge.

> If commissioners simply ‘rubber stamp’ a staff approved subdivision then there really would be no need for judgment and thinking of a commission.

You are right.  We aren’t just a rubber stamp.  But we also work within a legal framework.  I am not a fan of judicial activism by the U.S. Supreme court and want to make sure I don’t overstep my bounds in my role as a planning commissioner and start legislating when I’m supposed to be applying.

In this case I’m supposed to be hearing my Administrative hat, not my Legislative hat.

Our city development code states:

4.6.3 FINAL PLAT
4.6.3.9 PLANNING COMMISSION REVIEW

2. If the Final Plat and all supplementary data complies with the applicable requirements of these regulations and the requirements of the approved Preliminary Design Plan, the Planning Commission shall certify approval of the Plat on the space provided.

Notice the word “shall.”

However, as I understand the process there can be exceptions.  A “countervailing public interest” should result in a denial.  If an application meets all the requirements in the code but there is a countervailing public interest against the application then it can and should be denied.

“If a local government finds that a compelling, countervailing public interest would be jeopardized, it may deny the application, even though the application conforms to all land use maps and ordinances. The reasons for this denial must be expressed in writing.”  (http://propertyrights.utah.gov/landuseapps.html)

What is a  “compelling, countervailing public interest”?

“A compelling, countervailing public interest is a legitimate and substantive public problem that calls for immediate action. It is not merely a concern that calls for a reevaluation of past municipal judgment.”  (http://propertyrights.utah.gov/opinions/14_AO_Abstract.pdf)

I may need some more guidance on what that means but there is some interesting additional discussion at http://propertyrights.utah.gov/opinions/33_AO_Abstract.pdf.

See my post on leadership about how I feel that public officials are not above the law.  You may want someone to ignore a law for your benefit in a specific case.  There was a lot of talk at the meeting about Precedence.  A worse precedence than “building a retaining wall” is the precedence of circumventing the law.  It may benefit you in the first instance but it is respect for the law that protects all your rights.

We must not erode our nations tradition of the Rule of Law.

(I started this post about six months ago. Still relevant today. So much has happened since the Bank “bailout” that shows what a foolish move it was.)

Wall Street Journal, October 15, 2008, p. A1, A4,
At Moment of Truth, U.S. Forced Big Bankers To Blink

“As the meeting neared a close, each banker was handed a term sheet detailing how the government would take stakes valued at a combined $125 billion in their banks, and impose new restrictions over executive pay and dividend policies.
“The participants, among the nation’s best deal makers, were in a peculiar position. They weren’t allowed to negotiate. Mr. Paulson requested that each of them sign. It was for their own good and the good of the country, he said, according to a person in the room.”

” Policy makers knew they were taking unprecedented steps. It would take years to disentangle banks from the federal government.”

If you think it doesn’t matter what they do to those wealthy, over-paid bankers then please consider this from John Adams:

[Adams] stopped one night at a tavern in Shrewsbury, about forty miles from Boston. ” . . . as I was cold and wet I sat down at a good fire in the bar-room to dry my great coat and saddle-bags till a fire could be made in my chamber. There presently came in, one after another, half a dozen, or half a score, substantial yeomen of the neighborhood, who, sitting down to the fire after lighting their pipes, began a lively conversation upon politics. As I believed I was unknown to all of them, I sat in total silence to hear them. One said, “The people of Boston are distracted.” Another answered, “No wonder the people of Boston are distracted; oppression will make wise men mad.” A third said,·”What would you say, if a fellow should come to your house and tell you he was come to take a list of your cattle that parliament might tax you for them at so much a head? And how should you feel, if he was to go and break open your barn, to take down your oxen, cows, horses, and sheep?·” “What should I say?” replied the first; “I would knock him on the head.” “Well,” said a fourth, “if parliament can take away Mr. Hancock’s wharf and Mr. Rowe’s wharf, they can take away your barn and my house.” After much more reasoning in this style, a fifth, who had as yet been silent, broke out, “Well, it is high time for us to rebel. We must rebel some time or other: and we had better rebel now than any time to come: if we put it off for ten or twenty years, and let them go on as they have begun, they will get a strong party among us, and plague us a great deal more than they can now. As yet, they have but a small party on their side.” (John Adams, David McCullough, p. 74)

If you think your business is safe from government take over, think again. Ever wondered what it would be like working for the INS or the IRS? You may soon find out.

It is time for a peaceful, non-violent rebellion. Let’s hope that a violent one is never necessary.

Progressives take the lofty label of Progress.  However human nature doesn’t seem to have changed at all since the dawn of recorded history.  The basic govermental systems that the progressives advocate have been tried before and have succeeded only in giving power to demagogues.

The mainstream media and politicians act like we are in new territory.  They succeed in demonstrating once again the maxim that “Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”  (George Santayana).

1930, Former President Calvin Coolidge wrote:

When people are bewildered they tend to become credulous.  We are always in danger of expecting too much of the government.  When there is distress such expectations are enlarged.  The present condition of the country not only is not new, but not nearly so bad as it has been at other times.  In 1818 when John Quincy Adams learned of the failure of many of the greatest commercial houses he recorded in his diary that the greatest danger would be the application of remedies worse than the disease.

That is the danger now. All any government can do is to adopt certain policies and provide the public facilities of currency, banks, revenues, highways and the like that enable the people conveniently to do business.  A large expenditure of public money to stimulate trade is a temporary expedient which begs the question.  Many local governments are already taxing the people too much.  Business does not need more burdens but less.  The sound way to relieve distress is by direct action.  When a surplus exists it will do little good to spend public money for something more we do not need.  The people have more power than any government to restore their own prosperity.

(November 28, 1930, Calvin Coolidge Says, 1972 edition)

In the newspaper forums discussing political articles someone said “I see that ’socialism’ has become the new scary word for the right.”

Here is my reply:

Socialism should scare everyone on this forum. It is a means of concentrating power in the central government. Even if it is centralized for good reasons and benevolently dictated by “the people’s representative” it eventually falls into the hands of tyrants. Read the rest of this entry »

A few of our citizens are upset with me as well as two other members of the Planning Commission and a member of the City Council.  We voted to extend approval for the Preliminary Plan for Vista Meadows Subdivision.

Read the rest of this entry »

A lot to think about in this blog entry –
FISA: If You Vote for Hatch or Bennett Ever Again, You Are An Accessory To A Crime

Also, I’m grateful to Bishop and Mattheson for voting against the bailout bills.  The pork laden disasters may do a little (very little) short term “good” but are catastrophes for the long run.
Senate $700 Billion Bailout Pork and Police State Plan is an Utter Disgrace

Economically the bailout will further devalue the dollar, increase our huge national debt, and despite all their efforts to “price control” the value of the dollar will eventually break and drive us into runaway inflation.  Notice the nice little additions to the “Economic” bill that erode our right to a search warrant and other essential liberties.

I can’t vote for Hatch or Bennett ever again.

Back in mid-May I was invited to a “Meet-the-candidate night” for a local candidate.

I’m currently in the Utah Republican Party.  But for me it’s never been about the political party.  It’s not like a sports competition where I feel loyal for my team and always support my guys win or lose.  May I never sink my political activity to such a low level!  For me it’s about principle.

My attitude is in no small part because my father made sure that as a youth I was exposed to the following from George Washington’s Farewell Address (http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/washing.htm):

Read the rest of this entry »