Mayor Bob Foster’s 2009 State of the City Address was, by any measure, a historic break from the traditional method of meeting this annual City Charter-mandated obligation.
By taking his address out of the Convention Center, away from the direct fiscal benefit of the Chamber of Commerce and beyond the much more exclusive-seeming power luncheon for members of the City’s various inner circles. Mayor Foster, I believe, did a very good thing for all members of our community including; inner circles, outer fringes and all of the members of our community in between.
In short, Mayor Foster gave his annual message back to the people… the electorate… (even referring to his address, at one point, as “the people’s speech”) those to whom he, as well as every other elected and appointed City official must ultimately answer to. Though some seem exceedingly reluctant to remember that one simple truth.
In my column published on January 21, I addressed in greater detail what I felt to be the bigger picture in the 2009 State of the City address and my suggestions for making a good event better. In this column, however, I’d like to explore some of the actual content of Mayor Foster’s message to his constituents.
For those who did not attend or missed accessing the web-based simulcast, a link to the text of Mayor Foster’s address can be found on his Office web page, here.
If you’re more a fan of the audio-visual, you can see and hear a video of the entire presentation at this link.
I would sum up my overall impression, of The State of our City Address, as gained from Mayor Foster’s speech by borrowing four of his own words:
“This will be uncomfortable.”
The 12-page and nearly 4,000 word speech was delivered in just over half an hour. Mayor Foster had a lot of good things to say about our city, and rightly so. He talked about our character, our compassion and our spirit of cooperation in what he called our “future orientation.” He mentioned a couple of examples of each.
Such attributes are indeed evident in the City of Long Beach in varying degrees and it is appropriate for our Mayor to applaud each contribution.
Then came comments of another sort; equally necessary but not nearly so easy for some, especially those we’ve entrusted with crafting public policy (our elected and appointed officials) to have to hear.
The Mayor spoke of a weak economy and a “State government fractured and in turmoil,” declining city revenues, diminishing State funding and short-lived and uncertain Federal help. He reminded us of the increasing “competitive pressure” that our port is experiencing from other U.S. and international ports. In response to these dire conditions we must at once continue and increase our efforts in the areas of “reductions to City bureaucracy and thoughtful review of how we deliver basic City services,” Foster added.
Uncomfortable times indeed!
Some might opine that most (if not all) of the points made in this part of the speech were painfully self evident. That neither the people nor their elected or appointed representatives needed to have these conditions pointed out to them. Yet, in doing, so Mayor Foster seems to feel that these facts cannot possibly be pointed out loudly or often enough because some of us, electorate, elected and appointed alike, just do not seem to be getting the message. In this, I strongly agree with him
Our National, State and Local economies have been in decline for years now, and yet we, as a collective people, persist in spending more than we make and insist upon living beyond our means. At some point in our Nation’s, our State’s and our City’s history, a majority of us bought into the absurd notion that government should be all things to all people; that there is no single ill or injustice that government cannot correct; no need government cannot meet, no desire government cannot fulfill. A majority of us have come to believe that the more government does for us, the happier and more comfortable our collective lives will be.
Somewhere along the way we forgot the end results of such abjectly misguided beliefs. We forgot what happens when we try to live them out. We, as a self-governed people in a free society, have forgotten many things.
Permit me to offer a few reminders:
The more we permit government to do for us, the more it costs us to finance
This is why Californians currently pay the highest State taxes in the nation. This is not because we enjoy some sort of societal nirvana here, far from it. It’s because we permit government to do far too much on our behalf
The more demands we place upon government, the larger government must grow to accommodate those demands
This is why all levels of government, including local, have grown so bloated and financially voracious. It is not because of a few self-serving government officials, it’s because we have demanded more and more of a government that was never intended to take on so much of our personal responsibilities
The more we permit government to do and the larger we permit government to grow, the more of our personal treasure we must provide to maintain it
This is why last year… every… single… dollar you earned until May 10th went to meet your cumulative tax obligations. May 10th… almost half of the calendar year! Despite that we, in California, pay some of the highest tax rates in the nation, our Legislature is about to ask still more from us. Why are we not asking them, in numbers sufficient to no longer be ignored, how a State that collected over $111.5 billion in taxes from us last year still, inexplicably, does not seem to have enough money to pay its bills?
During his speech on January 13, Mayor Foster warned us that some of the things he had to say would be “uncomfortable”. In my view, we in Long Beach, in California and in the United States have not felt (nor are we feeling) nearly uncomfortable enough.
So let me see if I can help our collective “discomfort” along a little…
My friends, I tell you that we permit government to do far too much for us. We delegate far too much of our authority to government out of complacency, laziness and/or convenience and in the name of being “happy” and “comfortable”.
Our government, at all levels, is just that, “ours.” We have in many ways lost (surrendered) control of it. Our government costs too much and is bloated and inefficient because we have allowed it to become so. We must begin to remember our rightful place in the relationship between government and those that government was created and is intended to serve.
It is we, the People, who are sovereign and responsible for keeping government small, efficient, green, fair, just, and fiscally responsible.
Lastly: In remembering these critical facts we must, finally, begin to take positive and effective steps to get our governmental house in order.
As Mayor Foster stated so very succinctly, just last month, “This will be uncomfortable”
I very much welcome your comments and your questions.