Friday, April 3, 2009 | San Diego’s badly rigged online survey of voter preferences has sullied the reputation of SDSU, which put this con job together and then were dumb enough to admit it. Fortunately for the City Council majority, further sullying of their reputation is simply not possible.
The survey is designed to force people to favor tax increases. It lays out a false Hobson’s choice — raise taxes or cut services. But there’s a third option: Deliver city services at lower cost. That option is NOT listed.
On top of many efficiency improvements the city could implement (check with Carl DeMaio for scores of such improvements being ignored), there are two major ways to cut the cost of city services:
- 1. Cut city worker compensation — salaries and/or benefits.
- 2. Let outside contractors bid on providing city services.
Radical ideas? Hardly.
Escondido is having some success, reining in their runaway compensation costs. Their labor unions are reluctantly cooperating (except for the police).
Contracting out doesn’t work? Tell that to every other city in the county. Not one other city has a government trash collecting department.
Just because the city pays for trash collection does not mean that only city workers can or should collect the trash.
It’s obvious why the survey avoided these options. Any scientific poll of SD citizens would show strong support for such cost-cutting alternatives.
Indeed, the overwhelming passage of Prop C to encourage the city to pursue competitive bidding of city services is the REAL survey the politicians should look at for guidance.