City removes trash cans, streetlights to save cash (Bring your own trash bags!)

CNN ^ | Feb 25th, 2010

[TaraP]

Colorado Springs, Colorado (CNN) -- If you come to a neighborhood park in Colorado Springs, plan on bringing your own trash bags.

To save money, the city has removed the trash cans.

Need to catch a bus? Don't try on evenings or weekends. The city has cut that service, too.

And when the sun goes down, Colorado Springs is going to look a little bit dimmer. City crews are removing every third streetlight to save money on electricity and light bulbs.

Other governments are considering higher taxes to avoid such cutbacks, but in the state of Colorado, there is a taxpayers' bill of rights. It prevents state and city governments from raising taxes unless such a measure is approved by the voters.

[Drill Thrawl]

Yes they do. NOW and NARAL will vouch for that.

[Squawk 8888]

This is a very old game. I’ve worked in the public sector (education, health) and I know that huge dollars could be saved and nobody would notice, which is why they don’t get saved. The standard response to budget cuts is to cut back on the things that people will notice, in an effort to produce a backlash.

[Squawk 8888]

The best golf round I ever enjoyed was some club in SC that was so cheap/new that they didn’t even have a proper clubhouse, just a prefab unit with a bar. I was there as someone’s guest about ten years ago, all I remember is that it was less than an hour from Augusta, GA.

[Joe Boucher]

yep,
Stayed in the best hotel in town adn I wouldn’t sent my dog back there.
Try Indianwood, Indiantown.
No one there.
Or the Okeechobee golf and contry club.
No one there and you play with balc eagles watching.
Very nice courses.
Personally I play tree golf at my airpark.

[RockyMtnMan]

CS residents are too stubborn and smart to fall for that crap. I clean up trash that I see when I’m in the parks and if I see someone littering they’ll get an earful. Many of my co-workers are the same way, it’s a mentality that many people share here.

There are the “other” people that move in from other states that don’t understand the rules and have to be brought up to speed. Maybe the city will wise up and stop wasting money on non-essentials and all this non-sense will end.

[elli1]

"You can cry about the fiscal situation ... or you can take it as an opportunity to change, reinvent yourself and innovate and that's what were going to do in Colorado Springs," City Councilman Sean Paige said...."We put it on the ballot last fall, and they said 'no,' " said Paige, a Republican. "They declined to write the city a blank check, and they said, 'City, tighten your belts. We're tightening ours. You need to do the same.'

Refreshing POV.

[sergeantdave]

Most of the flunky bureaucrats in local government are there to steal taxpayer money and process the cash, after skimming off a few million for salary, benefits, graft and embezzlement.

[Svartalfiar]

“The city’s garbage collection, zoo and philharmonic are all privately funded.”

So why are city crews removing trash cans from parks? Even if garbage collection wasn’t private, the efforts needing to go into litter collection would not be offset from removing trash cans... They’ve already bought the cans, removing them won’t do anything!

[upchuck]

If you come to a neighborhood park in Colorado Springs, plan on bringing your own trash bags. To save money, the city has removed the trash cans.

Given human nature, I think this is a distinctly BAD idea. The parks will look like garbage dumps.

[bjorn14]

Too bad...growing up in CO, Springs is one my fave cities.

[BenKenobi]

That’s the idea. Do things that inconvenience people so that they will not be happy.

Personally, I wish they’d take down a streetlight out by my parent’s place. Interferes with stargazing.

[sionnsar]

Need to catch a bus? Don't try on evenings or weekends. The city has cut that service, too.

Evenings or weekends? Our service went to zero.

If you're waiting for the next bus... you have a very long wait. If you should live so long.

[Clint Williams]

City crews are removing every third streetlight to save money

B-b-b-b-b-ut Think About Going Green! Saving Energy! Reducing CO2 Emissions!!

They should go Totally Green and remove every lamp in the city!!!!!

[LomanBill]

>>Refreshing POV.

 

From a Socialist wolf in Libertarian sheepskin?  

 

 

Dreaming of Milk and Apples?

 

 

 

Paige is just parroting/pandering in response to the sentiment we Colorado Springs citizens declare in refusing to extend the City Council's no-limit credit card when we killed Measure 2c last November.

 

Paige likes to wrap himself up in the libertarian / TABOR (TAxpayer Bill Of Rights) flag - but where the $$ hits the river - he changes his tune:  Councilman Paige advocates public funding, via mandatory raised water rates, of the SDS (Southern water Delivery System). 

 

The SDS will benefit Colorado Spring's government-owned Utility Enterprise; and it will directly benefit Developers who, without SDS, can not build more McHouses in the same market where the Colorado Springs Housing authority already owns >350 properties.   The CS Housing authority is managed by Paige's fellow Colorado Springs City Council member, Larry Small.

 

PUBLIC housing?  

Daaaang, pretty swanky, ehh?

 

 

Now, is that more consistent with Libertarianism - OR - with Socialism?  Hmmm.

 

 

When Colorado Springs Government Utility/Enterprise wants to expand its infrastructure, all it presently has to do is get a rubber stamp from Paige and the other puppets on the city council.  That's a violation of the spirit of TABOR in the same way the Utility Enterprise's "Storm Water" fees were a violation. (We killed the Storm Water BS along with 2C last November)

 

If Councilman Paige was truly supportive of TABOR, he would simply advocate allowing the people of Colorado Springs to decide for themselves whether or not our financial resources should be used for the expansion of Government-owned Enterprises.... but, he doesn't.

 

Paige also advocates in favor of the Colorado Springs "medical" dope sellers.   Stoned and stupid sheeple easier to fleece, perhaps?

 

 

So....

 

Quack, Waddle... Councilman PIGGIE!

 

and remember "NO SLEEPING IN BEDS IN THE FARMHOUSE"  err {edit} "WIF SHEETS!".

[LomanBill]

>>Are the removing the whole structure or just the bulbs?

The structures are still there.

As, evidently, are the City maintenance crews.

[LomanBill]

[And how many union city/state employee jobs are they cutting?]

Yep.

[LomanBill]

>>there's nothing but office buildings left.

 

Yep - Empty ones...

 

I wonder if the same sheeple will get stuck holding the securitized bag for developing that Commercial Real Estate...

 

 

...as got stuck holding the bag full of securitized Sub-Prime A$$Paper that presumably helped build lots of these:

???

 

And they want to raise our water rates so they can build MORE of them?   

 

What wrong with that picture?  Is that how TABOR is supposed to work?  Hmmmm...

 

 

[sionnsar]

cutting bus service?

[LomanBill]

>>there's nothing but office buildings left.

 

Empty or not, they're still liable for property taxes.

 

This empty canary in the local coal mine, for example... which has never been occupied since completion:

 

 

Table	Use Code	2010 Market Value	2010 Assessed Value	Exempt
Land	OFFICES	872071	252900
Imp	OFFICE	7184817	2083600
	Total Value $	8056888	2336500

http://land.elpasoco.com/ScheduleDisplay.aspx?schd=6412402005

 

 

Wonder who's picking up / bailing out that tab?

[dragnet2]

Street lights are a huge waste of money and energy....

Good for Colorado....