South St. Louis County News

St. Louis Call Newspapers

South St. Louis County News

St. Louis Call Newspapers

South St. Louis County News

St. Louis Call Newspapers

Maddox and Miguel are using common sense

To the Editor,

When I observe all the vacant business places in Crestwood, including the plaza, it makes no sense to strap ourselves with this kind of debt.

Businesses have been our tax base and it appears this base is certainly being re-duced.

I’m not sure we need a $9 million dollar building when the one we have has served us for so many years. Let’s get our house in order before we consider this type of new debt.

The administrator, Don Greer, suggested a possible way to get our finances back on stable footing, but the board didn’t seem to want to consider anything but more spending. I read that the main concern was for the safety of employees and voters. I cannot remember ever hearing about a problem with prisoners being brought in or out of our present facility.

From what I read it appears we have two aldermen, Don Maddox and Jerry Miguel, who are using common sense and have a clear vision of what is happening to our city. Having lived in Crestwood over 50 years and attended many aldermen meetings, I have never known or heard of such arrogance and irresponsible action as that of our present Board of Aldermen and may-or.

Maybe our new mayor and the majority of the aldermen need to be replaced.

I am not much for Monday morning quarterbacks and I do have a lot of respect for the men and women who seek these positions and give many hours of their time to improve our community. It is nice to set high goals, but we must be realistic and practical.

Our community is in a stagnant growth position and I know that many of our residents, including myself, are retired and on a fixed income. My street has 14 homes of which 11 homes contain retired people. We certainly hope that we are not taxed out of our homes.

Please be kind to us and remember — where we are you will be in a few years.

Milton Solovic

Crestwood

Editor’s note: Crestwood voters on April 5 will consider a $6 million bond issue. A four-sevenths supermajority vote will be required to approve the bond issue, which would in-crease the city’s property tax rate by roughly 30 cents for a 10-year period until the bonds are retired. The $6 million bond issue would be used to allow the city to retire its line of credit with Southwest Bank, establish re-serves sufficient to meet the city’s cash-flow needs and reconcile debts the general fund owes other city funds. The “retrofitting” of the Government Center to include a new police facility is estimated to cost nearly $8 million and is being funded by certificates of participation issued in 2002. Voters in 2002 extended a half-cent, capital-improvements sales tax through 2023 for the new police facility, repairs at the Government Center and the continuation of the city’s street repair and replacement program.

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