SAC CITY, IOWA – OCTOBER 29, 2010
A loyal TSN viewer, “SC” wrote in today with the following challenge:
"Instead of making accusations about councilmen Johnston and Hansen about bad financial decisions why don't you list them???? Then tell us why they were bad???? And I see you now can predict the future??? Please tell me who is going to win the world series and I'll make a huge wager on your all knowing powers (NOT)...
SC, I think you are being unfair when you single out Jim Johnston and Gary Hansen.
According to Resolution 2009 - 05, the city employee that currently spends most of his summer days sitting behind the steering wheel of a lawn mower makes $18.30 per hour. According to Councilperson Jim Johnston, this city employee sat on the lawn mower for at least 40 hours per week this year. That means the city paid wages of $732.00 per week for a "skill" that most 9 year olds are able to master in a couple of hours.Now if it stopped there, that would be bad enough... but to make this scam worse, there is the question of benefits. According to City Administrator Adam Ledford, the average benefit package for each city employee averages $14,000ish per year. Divide that by 52 weeks, that's about $270.00 per week rounded. So now we're up to ...round off the two bucks and call it a $1,000 per week.
The city council is paying $1000.00 per week for a lawnmower man.
That, SC, is one serious waste of money. If you were running a business, it would be a no-brainer... You would hire a part timer during the summer for $10.00 per hour for 30 hours per week (so you don’t have to give them benefits,) and bring your costs down to about (carry the 1...) about $550.00 per week.
And food for thought, here. If the city rotated the areas that got mowed, instead of mowing every single blade of grass inside city limits to within an inch of its life every single week, even more money could be saved.
So you ask for a list of bad financial decisions Jim Johnston and Gary Hansen have made? I give you one the entire council shared in.
You Suck with Money #1: Voting on June 22, 2010 to rehire someone to mow lawns for $1000.00 per week when they could get it at half(ish) the price if only they’d quit mouth breathing long enough to smush the buttons down on the calculator built into their phones. (Mechanical adding machine with one of those great cha-clank! handles for Hansen)
...tbc
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Why not just contract out all the mowing just like they do in the cemetery?
ReplyDeleteYou really don't know much about lawn care do you? You can't rotate lawns in the summer the grass grows a ton so it needs to be mowed weekly or it will get out of hand and you would complain about that. Lawn care is not a super easy job as you make it out to be. So are you saying people making their living doing lawn care are lazy people with an easy job that a 9 year old can do? I'll go out on a limb saying you don't mow more then 2 lawns a week and probably do it in the evening when its cooler outside.
ReplyDeleteAnonymous 8:49,
ReplyDeleteWhat people who make a living taking care of lawns do is a completely different ball park than what the city does. I kind of doubt the city has anyone skilled or caring enough to take care of something like the cemetery… or at least I haven’t seen evidence of it. (Go look at the cemetery right now and compare that to any other time in history when the city DID take care of it, you will see what a world of difference there is between what a pro can do compared to what the city maintenance department is capable of.)
And yes, I think the kind of mowing the city does, (driving around in circles making greenish stuff shorter) is something any 9 year old can do. Is it lazy? It may be physically taxing, but it's certainly not lawn care the way we think of it when we are hiring someone with money directly out of our pockets, is it?
...and I think you are wrong about rotating the lawns. There are plenty of properties with no invasive weeds in danger of getting out of control that could be scheduled every two or three weeks without coming to harm. The city certainly has more than enough mower to whack down a three week grow. All it would take is committing it to a schedule. It happens in state parks all the time.
The city hired our "city mower" to do more than just mow. Doesn't he also spray for mosquitos and do snow removal? I'd like to see a 9 year old get up at 1AM to scoop snow!
ReplyDeleteActually I don't think I have ever seen our city mower drive around in circles mowing. He wouldn't get much accomplished now would he. I don't think he would mow every week if it wasn't needed !! And you Curtis are so worried about paying taxes?? Do you even pay any taxes?? You don't even work. Your girlfriend has to be paying the taxes she is the one working, is she not ?
ReplyDeletePeople that live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. Enough said!
ReplyDelete