On the subject of the former, the Rhino’s John Hammer says:
The conservative majority on the Greensboro City Councils gets the message. Led by Councilmember Trudy Wade, the conservative majority let it be known on Tuesday night, Feb. 15, that no longer will the staff be able to spend money as it sees fit and then tell the council what has happened.
Hammer is referring to the 7-2 vote —-with Robbie Perkins and Dianne Bellamy-Small voting ‘no’ —- requiring council approval before city staff can make budget adjustments of more than $50,000. The council “is also interested in having a say in grants before the city commits to them,” although in my humble opinion the council didn’t drive home the fact that many of these grants require matches from the city.
Then there’s this (emphasis mine):
By a unanimous vote the City Council agreed to allow Downtown Greensboro Inc. (DGI) to use some of its excess funds for a grant program for up to 10 grants of $25,000 each for new retail businesses downtown. DGI President Ed Wolverton said there were about a dozen empty storefronts along Elm Street and DGI thought these grants could provide an impetus to get some projects started. In addition to that $250,000, DGI also asked to be allowed to allocate $15,000 for a partnership with the Interactive Resource Center, which is the fancy name for the new day shelter for the homeless.
Remember the IRC came to the council for more funding back in December and, after a fair amount of deliberation, the council voted to fund $20,000 per month for up to three months. Now we read that DGI is ‘partnering’ with the shelter to provide another $15,000 “to help attract clients to the facility and its services during this critical start-up period.”
There was a considerable amount of discussion about this issue, during which council members Trudy Wade and Mary Rakestraw —to their credit —pressed Wolverton about who decides how DGI spends the 9-cent tax on downtown property owners. You guessed it —-the DGI board decides how to spend the money.
I just have to wonder how many downtown property owners would actually want their tax money spent on the homeless shelter when the city is already providing funding. For that matter, how many property owners even know their tax money is being spent to ‘partner’ with the homeless shelter?
