Saturday, May 26, 2018

Economic Development


This used to be the responsibility of the private sector and it worked very well.  Business people invested their own money to launch their businesses.  They controlled the process and took the risks.  If they failed, they paid for their failure out of their own pocket. These Business people did everything they could to succeed. They got minimum interference and had sole responsibility. When government overreach infected the private sector, corruption and dysfunction flourished.

 

It is extremely expensive to start a business or develop a property in the US. There are applications, fees, inspections, approvals and fines for noncompliance based on government laws and ordinances.

 

We have failed to keep government in its box. The federal government spends most of its revenue on unconstitutional programs that are far beyond its “enumerated powers”. It is lawless and out of control. State and local governments followed the federal example and failed to limit its powers and its footprint.  The end result is that government at all levels has failed to perform its most basic priorities.


These priorities include the construction, expansion and maintenance of roads, bridges, highways, water and sewer systems.  This is critical infrastructure needed in dense cities.  In rural areas and exurbs, we should be able to handle sewage through septic tank systems and get our water from wells.  We should also be able to establish gardens and grow out own food.  If our property is large enough, we should be able to raise animals including chickens for eggs and goats for milk and cheese.

 

Critical infrastructure is required to allow businesses and residents to function.  We can get our other services from utilities and pay for our other expenses in the private sector. This includes transportation, education, healthcare, food purchases and trash collection.

 

The function of government is to provide a nonintrusive environment for living and doing business. The objective is to obey the US Constitution (as written) and allow the private sector to function. The purpose of zoning and property ordinances is to avoid civil suits between property owners, so that nobody starts raising pigs or dumping trash in our subdivisions. It should not be to impose a government initiated central planning scheme on private property owners.

 

I started this Tea Party in 2011 after attending a “visioning session” to control the design of my local strip mall. I was shocked that the city was intruding on private commercial property owners. This was sanctioned by the city council and conducted by a consulting firm to implement UN Agenda 21 in my city.  The “visioning session” was rigged and used the “Delphi technique” to secure rigged data for voter input. This is still going on and the Georgia legislature has no intention to repeal the laws that dictate UN Agenda 21 implementation and all the abuse it causes.

 

Local government in Georgia is abusing private property rights in the name of “economic development” to increase their property tax revenues. This government overreach has distorted all traditional development incentives. Business people now make a dive for the front end of a bad idea and bail as quickly as they can, before the bad idea becomes obvious. Developers and builders take the money and run.

 

Local government in Georgia is abusing taxpayers with costs that have quadrupled since 2010. They need to impose performance Bonds on vendors and return to taking the lowest bid.  We are sure that bribes are being paid and corruption is wide-spread.

 

Norb Leahy, Dunwoody GA Tea Party Leader


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