DISCUSSION: STARK COUNTY 10.6% UNEMPLOYMENT PUTS OFFICE UNDER STRESS?

Recently, Stark County Treasurer Gary D. Zeigler has been under a great deal of stress managing the treasurer's office.

This year he expects to receive $107,079.30 less in his general fund.

What to do?

Cut employees?

No.

With a 10.6% unemployment rate (as of February), the last thing Stark County needs is to be cutting jobs.

He reconfigured the hours county treasury employees work in order to cut the total number of house they work in order to save county taxpayers money while maintaining the number of hours the office is open to the general public.

Zeigler says his office will $48,000 over the time span of April through December, 2009.

The graphic above (i.e. 105 ways) is tongue-in-cheek, but these days county officials across the board have had to get creative to simply stay afloat notwithstanding increased monies coming into county coffers because Commissioner Todd Bosley had the political gonads to persuade the Board of County Commissioners to impose a 1/4% increase in the county sales/use tax.

Treasurer Zeigler believes any new money will be a wash because of lost money on investments and other shortfalls (because of the depressed economy) revenues.

That raises the question: What if the effort by the Stark Citizens Right to Vote Committee to repeal the sales/use tax succeeds?

If it does, then 105 ways will truly be in play.

And it will be no fun at all being a county official.

However, what the Stark Citizens Right to Vote Committee has to look forward to is a massive turnout out of county workers to fight the the repeal. After all, there very jobs will be at stake.

The STARK COUNTY POLITICAL REPORT (The Report) believes the effort to repeal has virtually no chance to succeed.

But as scary as it is that anytime a repeal effort gets on the ballot, there is a chance it might pass, The Report thinks that a rejection vote of the repeal effort helps Stark County over the long term.

How so?

In terms of perceived legitimacy and, of course, breaking Stark County's seemingly perennial cycle of not being real about the reality that it does take money to provide government services and to provide infrastructure monies to help with economic development efforts.