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July 10, 2007

A Golden Ring in Their Snout

In a City filled with (and in many senses, still run by) Churches, a City request for an increase to half a million dollars to engage in "faith-based initiatives" seems dubious at best. The questions are (as always), what's the specific problem that needs to be solved and what's the most effective way to address that problem?

In this situation, one wonders if the City considers the region-blanketing marketing campaigns of First Things First to be insufficient? Or perhaps our Churches and Charities simply aren't getting the word out... about Churches and Charities, and therefore we need the City to step in to pick up the slack.

Our current City government does not feel it's required to give justification for line-items in its budget, at best it gives vague tautologies. Budget requests along with explanation and justification need to be posted online in an easy to find location along with being disseminated to local media. This would make our City more accountable, less corrupt, and more effective.

related aside: the AEC & African American Chamber of Commerce (now the Tennessee Multicultural Chamber of Commerce) do more to support and encourage multicultural events and education with next to no budget than the City will ever accomplish with $329K.