Downtown Public Wifi

The same old record plays here.

A very small percentage of the city's population gathers downtown. The group consists of start-up, want to be business owners potentially looking for a city loan from the taxpayer coffers. City leaders are among those at the table who work with these specially selected friends of the city and who will approve the spending of our money as it goes from public funds into private sector hands. The public is not represented here and has no voice. They all have a common interest in building their downtown empire. They use private business money, at times, which is a good thing. They use city taxpayer money, at times, which is a bad thing. They decide what is best for THEIR downtown. This public wifi spending is an example. If the business owners want wifi, pool the money and purchase it. It will benefit YOUR business and should be funded by YOU. It is NOT a freebie on the taxpayer but rather, the cost of doing business. Write it off on your business taxes if allowed. The designation "Their" is used because the downtown development interest only involves a very small, select number of people living here. The rest of us could care less what is offered in their downtown business world. The theme does not match the demographic interest.

Council is guilty for approving this type of city spending.

The city never has asked if they should spend our tax money on private endeavors in their downtown. They could care less what our opinions are on the matter. People who are against the use of our money for this never voice their opposition at council meetings because they know they are wasting their time in their three minutes behind the podium. Writing letters to city leaders is futile. Council, friends of the city and the city manager look down and away while those with opposing views speak and tolerate the three minutes before restarting what THEY want for THEIR city. They don't hear a thing we say. Been going on here for three or four decades.

And while we're at it..........


Same goes for the school board and their one track mindset for the schools which are academic losers. (They won't listen to the people either). They are content in keeping it that way based on the number of years with no improvement. In both instances, once the council and school board members have your vote, and they are sitting behind that desk, they could care less what you think if you are a dissenter........until it is time for re-election when they have the audacity to ask you for your vote once again. Apparently, they are incapable of being shamed as well. They can't be proud to take pay for their performance.

Said a million times on this forum and now once again.......vote all incumbents off both council and the school board and purge each voting cycle until we have people on both who will listen to the people and give them what they want for our city. Neither works for the people who elected them to their positions.

Time for a total purge and replace on council.......then, we fire the city manager and have council hire one with the people's agenda rather than their own.

Likewise, time for a total purge and replace on the school board.....then, we fire the superintendent and replace him with one who will improve the academics instead of just building fancy new schools. The super and school board are in place to get new facilities built..... not to educate the kids.

I don't have a dog in the tax debate so I will steer clear of that and who should be paying for this. But if done right, the wifi is an excellent idea. If like some others around the country and at many restaurants now, you have to provide your email address to get full service. That creates a way to target a specific group of people who like to get out of the house for events, specials, concerts etc. This gets people to maybe also follow on Twitter, forward the email to friends, etc. I get regular emails from several places I have went to around the tri state and I love it, you can always opt out if you get deluged.

Spot on Spidey...