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21
Apr 2009
Not so stimulating
Posted by Scott Spielman
at 11:59 AM | Comments
Members of the Northville Downtown Development Authority (DDA) board huddled this morning to discuss their upcoming budget year.
They’re scheduled to meet with the city council about the budget tomorrow night. One of the questions that came up was: how can we help?
Another was: are there any stimulus funds available?
Former Mayor Pro Tem Carolann Ayers wanted to know about that. She just returned from a trip to Florida where (gasp) counties were already distributing stimulus funds o smaller communities. Why was it taking so long here, she wanted to know, given that Michigan is just behind California in terms of the amount of stimulus funding that will be received.
My first thought was that the county would be slowing things down. It’s hard to purge myself of that line of thought. It turns out it’s not accurate, though. Because Northville is a small city and not an entitlement community (which essentially means they can take care of themselves, financially), they’re not high on the list. Any stimulus funding must come through the state and the guidelines for the grants haven’t even been defined yet.
Mayor Christopher Johnson did, indeed, point out the obvious when he said of the funding: There’s obviously a desire to keep as much at the state level as long as possible.
Indeed, I’ve heard hints that some of the stimulus funding would go to patch holes in the state budget and, no matter what your opinion on the federal package is, this is something that should concern—if not enrage—you.
This money is designed to get people working, to stimulate the economy. It’s not supposed to be a band-aid for lawmakers that lack the couage or the smarts to enact needed government reforms. We need long-term fixes, not short term diversions.
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