RESPONSIBILITIES FOR DEMOCRATIC PROCESS IS TO ADHERE TO THE STRATEGIC PLAN People me Today at 12:58 PM To Mitch Deisch Coleen Kenny [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] and 3 more... Much thought and work supported the writing of the City Strategic Plan. There are times when this plan needs to be revisited and NOW is that time. At least we all need to review the preface to ensure the future of the City remains a viable asset. Preface In 2007, Manistee’s City Council developed a Strategic Plan to guide the City’s future that is revisited annually by Council. While the City’s strategy has evolved as opportunities and conditions have changed, the vision for the City remains unchanged: “To be a community of choice on the northwest Michigan coastline.” Following is the City of Manistee’s Updated Strategic Plan for the calendar years 2013 through 2016. In updating this Strategic Plan, a number of themes are worth noting: Progress. Progress is being made toward the vision of being “a community of choice.” While much work remains, we have made important strides in developing our beaches, our downtown and our core infrastructure to benefit our residents, visitors and businesses. The following pages highlight some of these accomplishments. Financial Challenges. We are doing what we can during these uncertain economic times to be proactive and fiscally prudent in charting a course for the future. We need to realize that the broad scope of services the City provides will be increasingly challenged to ensure that we are directing shrinking resources toward essential government services that have the greatest return for our community. We will also continue to develop measures for our strategies and goals so that we can understand and monitor progress. Collaboration. We must continue and accelerate to lead in developing “win-win” partnerships with our neighbors and identify ways to share services and resources so that our quality of life can be sustained with services that can be more efficiently delivered through partnerships. We hope that all community interests will review this updated Strategic Plan, offer your suggestions and ideas on how our community can be improved and join us in a united front to truly be the “community of choice.” Issues of concern: Basing garbage fees on property valuations is so old-school (i.e., communism). From each according to his ability — to each according to his need. We have a consolidated government. We need to do away with this old city good-ole boy system. 1.15 mills for city refuse needs to be dropped from property taxes. This needs to treated as most all millages as the Headlee Amendment requires: voted on by the voters. Not taxation without representation. Will other services be taxed using the same methods, that is, water, electricity, telephone, gas etc? On 13 January 2015 the opportunity was provided for the council to save the City at least $60,000 per year by contracting the City Assessors function. Very little evidence was provided to support hiring another assessor but the council refused to remove blinders and provided only a sympathy vote based on innuendo instead of facts. Once again failure to represent your constituents has been overlooked. Recently, I was reminded by a commissioner as to the (lack of) rationale why the advice of constituents was not sought. They elected me because I am smarter and therefore I speak for them. Wrong answer! Are we really being prudent to meeting Financial Challenges, as stated in the Preface above, in charting a course for our future?
Posted on: Thu, 15 Jan 2015 18:37:43 +0000
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