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Tornquist ready to shut down Human Rights to save $18K

Scott was not a computer when he used his fuzzy math to try and save $18K in our budget.
Scott Tornquist seems to need new circuits in his microchip.  The numbers he threw around Tuesday night only save the city $18K total… at a cost of losing Human Rights.

Editorial by Matt Marquardt –

I guess I thought in order to be an engineer you had to be good with numbers.

At Tuesday night’s budget hearing, which lasted nearly three hours, At-Large City Councilman Scott Tornquist waited until nearly the end of the meeting to talk about “where the rubber hits the road” for him, meaning the $15.18 tax hike he and the rest of the council and Mayor Bookmeyer are passing on to us due to their out-of-control spending. Much more on that later.

At the end of the game, it turns out that the council would need to cut $295,000 from this year’s budget so that taxes would not go up on the property owners. The council, after spending the city into this position in the first place, sat there racking their brains trying to figure out a way out of the tax hike. It is, after all, an election year, and more than one of them could be on shaky ground.

Tornquist zeroed in on Human Rights, as he has numerous times in the past, and threw around some numbers. He tried to make a case that crippling or shutting down Human Rights in Mason City would cut all or some of $143,000 from the budget, thus getting them closer to to nixing the tax hike.

“We’re basically spending $143,000 in the Human Rights Department to get $85,000 in grants,” Tornquist said. “I have to wonder if that is the best bang for the buck. I talked to our city attorney… we are not required to have a Human Rights Commission.”

Tornquist then goes on to say that “some level of funding would be required” if Human Rights were reduced but kept around in Mason City. “Probably in the neighborhood of $20,000 to $40,000.”

In other words, Tornquist (who also seemed to indicate he wanted to keep Human Rights in Mason City, although I don’t think anyone in the room believed him) would be ready to concede the spending of up to $40,000 to keep the commission and/or department funded.

The problem is, as Human Rights Commissioner Dean Genth stated, Human Rights loses their grant funding if the City doesn’t properly fund the department and commission.

By Tornquist’s own words, then, the city at this time spends $143,000 in order to receive $85,000 in grants. That is a total net cost to the city of $58,000.

Tornquist indicated to keep Human Rights hobbling along in Mason City – under a re-organization of some kind – a cost of up to $40,000 to the city would be required.

That, folks, is a difference of only $18,000, a mere pittance in the multi-million dollar budget and only about 6% of the $295,000 needed to undo the damage already done to the budget which required the tax hike in the first place.

Tornquist said “this is what has been keeping me up late at night.”

Scott, did you lose any sleep before handing out $45,000 for sculptures? How many sleepless nights did you spend before voting yes to hand your neighbor thousands of dollars to expand his business?  Did you sleep well when you voted “yes” to a $76,000 City Hall renovation?

Scott, please, have your micro-chips checked perhaps at Radio Shack or maybe call the Geek Squad so you can compute your math and bend the numbers in a more convincing fashion.

—————–

Watch video of discussion:

httpv://youtu.be/dZtef-UqTBc

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