IS IT TRUE August 16, 2012 Part 2: Raises and Neglect

IS IT TRUE August 16, 2012 Part 2

IS IT TRUE that Mayor Winnecke has submitted a budget to the City Council that has the salary increases for the “Golden 10” included?…the budget also includes a 3% across the board raise for City of Evansville employees in 2013?…this caused a bit of an uproar at the Council meeting last night as a motion by Dr. Dan Adams to limit increases to 3% for all ended in a tie with John Friend, Dan McGinn, Jonathan Weaver, and Council President Connie Robinson?…the vote was 4 – 4 as Conor O’Daniel was absent?…this is an interesting quagmire for the City Council to deal with as across the board increases almost always result in the best employees leaving and the worst staying forever?…that all people may be created equal but they surely do not perform equally?…to appease the bad at the expense of the good guarantees long term mediocrity or worse?…Jack Welch, the legendary CEO of General Electric to it the other direction by firing the bottom 10% of performers every year?…while Jack ran GE it became the most valuable company on earth?…since his departure GE has softened up and fallen in value by over 60%?…that maybe the City Council should consider capping the cumulative raise pool at 3% to reflect the City’s ability to absorb higher salaries but leave the distribution of these raises up to department heads?…this does not necessarily mean that the “Golden 10” are really golden or even top performers but it does create the freedom for city management to identify and incentivize top performers even if there are more than 10 of them?…it also give the City the ability to send a strong message of NO RAISE to marginal and poor performers?

IS IT TRUE that maybe the reality of the situation is that the City of Evansville can’t afford any raises at all at this time?…that a true leader would transmit that information in a way that most top performers would stay and in a way that the poor performers would be forced out?

IS IT TRUE that Mayor Winnecke has also decided to move forward with a so called jobs plan that includes much of the Johnson Controls Contract that he is rebranding as a Smart City Initiative?…the Mayor claims that his Smart City Initiative will create 170 jobs and that it is an evolution in progress from the Weinzapfel Administration?…that it is an accepted fact that every job created by government requires the taxes from 7 private sector jobs to support it?…using this math that the 170 jobs that will supposedly be created by the Mayor’s Smart City plan will require 1,200 new private sector jobs of the type that actually pays taxes to support this spending?…we must ask the question, where are those 1,200 jobs coming from when things like the Champion Labs move their headquarters out of Evansville and their manufacturing out of the Tri-State altogether?…that an expansion of government in a contracting economy is a formula followed by Greece, Spain, France, and Ireland?…that Mayor Winnecke and former Mayor Weinzapfel must have attended the Barack Obama School of Economics when it comes to having any concept of reality when it comes to balancing government and private spending?

IS IT TRUE that it has come to our attention that the McCurdy Hotel is becoming a target for graffiti and is rapidly deteriorating without being secured?…the Vanderburgh County Assessor’s website still reports that City Centre Properties LLC of Carmel, IN owns the McCurdy and that the taxes are more than a year into delinquency?…that it seems as though the age old practice of DEMOLITION BY NEGLECT is being utilized on the McCurdy?…there is local precedent and expertise in the practice of getting something on the list for the wrecking ball by neglecting to maintain?…the old Skora Building and Roberts Stadium are two recent examples of DEMOLITION BY NEGLECT?…in the case of Roberts that this practice was orchestrated by the government of the City of Evansville but in the case of the McCurdy it just seems to be happening on its own?…that the historical society should be looking into why the McCurdy is being DEMOLISHED BY NEGLECT and do everything in their power to reverse this travesty?