Muscatine

As far as I can determine, none of the people now running for seats on the city council have bothered to do any research on the issues whatsover. One wants more funds for streets, not bothering to find out that the city has spent a great deal on streets this past year and has committed to a 5 year plan to spend more in future years.
None of them has an issue, and none of them has been paying attention. All of them ''just want to help the community'' but none have any concrete ideas.
I see no character, morals, integrity, but I do see people who seem unfocused and not at all involved. Should they at least tell us what they think is wrong, why it's wrong, and how they plan to fix it?
One of them made some absurd statement that there is some sort of relationship between high paying jobs and property taxes? Wages have nothing to do with property taxes. Is the local hourly wage a problem? If so, who says? How would government at any level control wages? Isn't that socialism?
I'm happy that there's interest in local government, but none of the declared candididates seem to have a grasp of the current problems facing the city, and a clue as to how to remedy them.

Didn't notice-

but thanks for pointing that out. It will help when asking them questions.

The Issues

Glad you asked. I'm running for Mayor - and even though I won't have voting power, I'd have the power to fix a lot of issues anyway by guiding the city in the right direction. I have a detailed website telling what I think is wrong and how we should fix it, but I'll elaborate here for you.

===Drug Problem===
According to data released by the Muscatine Police Department:
''Drug crimes among juveniles younger than thirteen and females under 18 have continually increased. These two categories seem to be most at risk of increased criminal offending.''

Moreover, Muscatine is classified as a High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA), meaning more drugs pass through Muscatine than we want to deal with. To emphasize, the Muscatine County Drug Task Force has confiscated more methamphetamine than the Polk County area Task Force this past year, and has generated more drug defendants to the Federal Court System than any previous year of its existence.

This means the drug problem is big in Muscatine. I see two of the most important ways to fix it will focus around youth. 1) Create more extracurricular youth activities not affiliated with the schools to get more youth involved in socializing and interaction in a POSITIVE atmosphere (rather than who-knows-whos basement, for example). 2) Teach children and youth the reasons not to use drugs or drink alcohol. I'm also considering expanding funds for the PD, but only under certain conditions (more about that is on my website...)

===Budgetary Issues===
Many candidates say they want to fix up the budget... but its tough for them to say how. Keeping taxes low and services high is quite the challenge - if you've ever owned a business you know that you :usually: have to charge more to provide better service. But my goal to help with the budget and to cut spending is to switch all software we use to Open Source software. While we haven't got an exact estimate yet, this will save the city thousands per year. In addition, using 'thin clients' connected to Open Source Linux servers will make updating and maintaining these systems even easier. Unlike regular PCs which generally last up to 5 years (with continual, heavy maintenance), they types of systems last 10 years with ease.

This is currently implemented in Largo, FL (pop 60,000 or so?)
http://www.linux.com/feature/119109

I also think they do something with Open Source software in West Liberty, but I haven't got to talk to their city manager recently.

And other than those two main issues, the rest is the same type of thing everyone else talks about, so I'll stay out of that. Any questions about these issues/goals?

my thoughts

Here goes, Ryan, I think you can have all the after school programs you want, but the kids that are going to chose drugs won't come to the programs. I can look students, no I look at he parents, and I can tell you which kids will succeed and which will be drop outs and criminals. You can assign mentors and ''big brothers'' but its the parents who have the most contact and the most influence on the children. I wish setting kids on the right path was as easy as after school programs.
Don't even get me started on more police. It's hard to sell me on the fact that we need more police when just this AM I called the police because of a break in of a shed. The police man asked if there was other damage. I said I didn't know and I was afraid to go around the building by myself. He said well if I found any thing wrong to call back after 6 AM so the day shift would have to respond. He then told me to have a nice day and drove off.