I give DuPage County Board member Robert Schroeder credit for saying it - the all-Republican DuPage County Board has failed the people it serves. In today’s Chicago Tribune Schroeder takes his share of the blame, “The County Board should have started planning sooner for the impending loss of Water Commission money, he said. ‘I’ve been on the board a long time, so I take some of the responsibility for that.’” He’s right - especially about the irresponsible budgeting that led to this crisis.
DuPage County Board Chair Robert Schillerstrom has presented a $470 million budget that devastates human services
-> Cutting in half funding to Access DuPage, which provides health services for uninsured low-income DuPage residents who cannot get health services elsewhere
-> “The health department and convalescent center each might receive about $2 million less from the county than they got this year. Schillerstrom said such cuts would ‘force dramatic staff reductions’ at the convalescent center,” according to the Daily Herald.
-> Not-for-profit community services grants will face a cut of over 60% - from $750,000 to $290,000.
The proposed budget also hits law enforcement and the courts hard
-> The State’s Attorney Office faces a substantial cut that may affect a number of programs designed to reduce and address gangs, domestic abuse and child abuse. According to State’s Attorney Joe Birkett, “These are quality-of-life programs. When you take them away, it means crime will go up.”
-> The DuPage County Sheriff’s Office faces a $3 million cut that may end up eliminating the department’s crime lab, creating a backlog of forensic cases.
Meanwhile, while the DuPage County Board recently voted itself substantial salary increases for their part-time jobs, despite one member saying that some on the board “don’t pull their weight.” On the flip side county employees, many full-time, who do the real work will face over 60 job cuts and no cost of living increase. Where are the priorities? Where is the leadership?
Of course the county board has already increased DuPage resident’s high property taxes to the maximum allowed by law this year - it’s a perfect example of irresponsible Republican County Board tax and spend government that fails to plan for our future, and makes us pay for their failure.
The Chicago Tribune has the “money quote” on the issue delivered by DuPage County Board member Brien Sheahan of Elmhurst who said he thought the board should start thinking now of how to avoid “crises” like this in the future,
“What’s important to me is … making sure we don’t put ourselves in this position again. We should have a five-year plan that’s published, transparent and inclusive of countywide officials and departments so everybody understands where we are and where we’re going.”
Like Robert Schroeder, I give Brien Sheahan credit for taking blame for his failure - but why should we elect Republicans that now, in time of a predictable budget shortfall (predictable since we got the water funds in 2003) only have begun to realize they must plan for the future. Isn’t the job about planning for the future? The Daily Herald’s John Zimmerman got it right this summer when he called the DuPage GOP the “Grand Old Pretenders” - this ‘playing around’ has cost DuPage residents money and crucial county services. It’s time to get serious. It’s time for a change. It’s time to vote Democrat for the DuPage County Board. We’ve tried it the other way - and look at the state of DuPage under Republican failure.
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