Gary City Councilwoman Ragen Hatcher wants to require all department heads as well as new employees to live within the city limits. The Post-Tribune doesn't think this is such a hot idea:
While it would be nice for Gary employees to want to live in the city, it is important to understand why 20 percent of the Gary workers live outside the city.
Councilwoman Marilyn Krusas, who represents the Miller and Aetna sections of the city, told Hatcher that public safety and the poor condition of the public schools are the two main reasons some Gary employees elect to live outside the city.
[. . .]
Gary Mayor Rudy Clay, the eternal optimist, contends that Gary is a safe city. We respectfully disagree. Gary won't be safe until narcotics are removed from the city streets.
But those city workers are empolyed by and paid for by the citizens of Gary and are responsible for the condition of the city, which includes, among other things, public safety. If the city is so unsafe that public employees feel they have to live outside the city, isn't that an admission that they aren't getting the job done and should be fired?
Comments
When the going gets tough, the tough get going - and when the tough get going, the going gets REALLY tough.
It's not reasonable to fire a cop or a fireman because the schools are bad. It's not reasonable to fire a teacher because there is so much crime.
But if city employees are required to live inside city limits, that puts some feet to the fire, to get things fixed. And if that's true, it's not just department heads and new hires that should live in the city, it should be all employees. Employees, after all, pressure their boss to make things work.
Right now is NOT a good time to sell one house and buy another, but giving employees notice that they have two years, or three years or even five years to move inside the city is a good idea.
"and are responsible for the condition of the city" - really, ... just exactly how is that supposed to work, and has it ever worked anywhere. Not sure you could employee enough people to really be effective at changing the "condition of the city" - doesn't it have a lot to do with all of us in our cities ?
I dunno. Sounds like the same kind of pressure on GM workers around here to buy the crappy product they make. Not that they have any control over how well or crappily made the product is because they have absolutely nothing to do with the poor design and engineering and cheap materials they're forced to work with.
Forgive me, any GM afficionados out there, but I just bought one after being cajoled into it by people who say GM products are finally on a par with Toyota and Honda. Mine sure as hell isn't.
Alex:
I'm not offended...I bought my Firebird back in the 80s in NJ (was assembled in Norwood, OH...probably on a TUESDAY)..LOL!
Gary is one instance where the BROKEN WINDOW THEORY has no meaning. And the reason would be that they not only have NO windows left to break, but the warehouse has crumbled to the ground around the city officials...and everyone stands around with their thumbs up their rectal apertures and says "what happened"?
Kind of hard to do "damage control" when everything's WAY beyond being just damaged.
But at least here in Fort Wayne, we do have a "window" to OUR (possible) future.
;)
B.G.