Thursday, Dec. 7, 2006 | I read in the Dec. 6th San Diego Union Tribune three articles that seem to be indicating our politicians are shooting in the dark. One was about the County Board of Supervisors voting to “stop paying…health care for thousands of current and future retirees…” Another, the implementation of Prop C, regarded the outsourcing of city services without any guarantees of health insurance or livable wages to be paid by the ensuing city contractors. Then the third article explained how the City Council approved a plan to show it can produce 18,000 housing units affordable to low-income households.
It seems that affordable wages and decent health care insurance would go a long way toward reducing the need for those 18,000 low-income housing units. Of course, as the U-T points out, “state law does not require that the units actually be built, only that the city demonstrate it has land zoned to meet those goals.”
I may be a little slow but this sounds like a lot of people, from the state on down through the county and city, talking out of both sides of their mouths. The County Board of Supervisors held a mandated public meeting where about three people supported and 200 people objected to the plan to cut retiree health benefits, yet, in a well choreographed little dance they went ahead and voted for cuts. They had 6 months before the new GASBY accounting rules go into effect, yet they turned deaf ears to unions actually in the process of working out ways to fund the health benefits, and refused to delay their decision to allow time to work out the details. Can anyone really believe these politicians actually care about the people they represent?