Incomplete (i-e ‘Tip of the Iceberg’) list of U.S. Federal/State/Local Government self-destruct announcements for October 2017:

Alabama: More than a day late and a dollar short.  The leaders of Montgomery finally approved an overdue (by mandated timeline) budget that spends $2-million USD more on ‘public safety’, spends $400-thousand to tear down the plethora of abandoned houses and puts cash into the city’s reserve funds in order to please credit ratings agencies.  Part of the money for that will come from increased taxation of hotels.

Alaska: The mayor of Fairbanks is asking for layoffs in an effort to keep the city’s currently balanced budget from going ‘red’, due to expected state taxpayer funding cuts.

California:  The city of Bakersfield warning taxpaying residents of layoffs and tax hikes due to the crashing local agriculture (farms), insurance (State Farm) and oil (Chevron) industry job markets.  Hundreds more layoffs are expected in those industries over the next year.  The city is already millions of dollars in debt, and without layoffs and tax hikes could be $16-million USD in debt within five years.  One third of city tax revenues comes from sales tax, which has crashed since mass layoffs in the private sector began a few years ago, the city wants cash strapped voters to approve a sales tax hike in the near future.  The nearby city of Arvin is also blaming crashing private sector employment (mainly agriculture) on creating a $1.8-million USD city budget shortfall.  City leaders also revealed that “The bulk of our reserve [funding] is I-O-Us.”  This indicates the city is on the verge of bankruptcy.   City leaders of Santa Monica boasting that their plans have resulted in increased tax revenues/fees for the city and lower operating costs, however, local news media revealed that 90% of the savings in operating costs were the result of city leaders not filling 121 vacant positions!  Boastful Santa Monica leaders also revealed the city is dealing with unprecedented homelessness by promising to spend $1.4-million USD to address it.  (get it, ‘address’, ‘homeless’)

Colorado: City of La Junta cutting $235-thousand USD from its water system upgrades, yet increasing spending on electric upgrades by $31-thousand, over previous budget proposals for next year.  The city of Loveland passed a record setting budget that includes hiring more cops and buying more cop cars.  Local news media revealed that the budget is so complicated that the city published a response to try and answer at least 27 questions about it.

Connecticut: New London warning of an $8-million USD cut in the city’s general funds due to lack of tax revenues.

Florida: At NASA Kennedy Space Center, tax-sucking contractor Vencore eliminating 66 jobs after Xmas (in addition to the 312 layoffs announced in September).

Georgia: The city of Augusta is blaming its own employees for skyrocketing budget costs, accusing them of over-using hospital emergency rooms, which under ObamaCare-AffordableCareAct has seen the costs of such ER visits go through the roof.  Interestingly the skyrocketing use of ERs by city employees began after ObamaCare went into effect.  Last year 837 city employees went to the ER, costing taxpayers just short of $1-million USD!  Total overall healthcare costs racked up by city employees cost taxpayers $27-million USD (and that includes 62% of employees getting a ‘wellness discount’)!  Damn, Augusta has some really sick city employees.

Idaho:  Idaho taxpayer funded France based public transportation contractor Transdev-Valley Regional Transit-ValleyRide issued a WARN, 102 Boise jobs gone in November!  American Falls getting a state taxpayer funded grant of $20-thousand USD to fix-up its water system, however, city taxpayers still have to come up with an additional $20-thousand.  Iona City wants to issue $3.9-billion USD in bonds (debt that has to be paid back by all you happy taxpayers) to improve its water system, which will cause water bills to go up by $19 per month (I live in the city of Chubbuck and they issued so many bonds, most without our knowledge, that our basic [not counting the per thousand gallon water use rate] water/trash bills went from $39 per month in the late 1990s to almost $1-hundred now!  And they recently issued another $3-million in bonds for “property improvement” projects, which we taxpayers have to eventually payoff!).  Taxpayers continue funding the ongoing FBI data center project in Pocatello.  The project started a year and a half ago, but only now had an official groundbreaking ceremony (last year ignorant local news media said the project would be done by now).  The Federal Bureau of Investigation says it’ll be one of three such ‘core enterprise facilities’ in the U.S., which are meant to save taxpayers money by consolidating existing data centers (less operating costs, including less people) and by using the so called cloud.  Also in Pocatello, ON Semiconductor got a $335-thousand USD state taxpayer funded grant to create five new jobs.  Most of the grant money will go towards retraining existing employees.  The South Fork Archery Range being for forced to shutdown because the city of Idaho Falls is refusing to renew the lease, local news reports say the city owned electrical utility is planning to use the land for a substation.    In Bannock County the Sheriff is again begging cash-strapped taxpayers to agree to fork-over $16-million USD to expand the prison, due to prison overcrowding in the Mormon dominated county.   While Bannock County struggles with prison overcrowding, Ada County (home of the state capital Boise) was awarded a MacArthur Foundation’s Safety and Justice Challenge $1-million USD grant to shape up its ‘criminal justice’ system.  The piddly grant will create eight new jobs to combat the skyrocketing prison population. The Gem State has yet to comply with the federal police-state Homeland Security on issuing federally tracked Real-IDs, however, the state Department of Transportation announced it will begin doing so in 2018, so get ready to fork-over some big bucks so Big Brother can track you!  For the second month in a row another state official resigned without warning, this time Republican Brandon Hixon suddenly resigned after it was revealed he was under criminal investigation by Caldwell Police, no other info was made public.

Illinois: Obama installed mayor of Rahm Emanuel willing to force cash-strapped taxpayers to give Amazon $6-billion USD in tax breaks if the online company sets up a secondary HQ in Chicago! The state comptroller’s office admits it can’t pay the bills due to crashing tax revenues, “That’s in addition to $9 billion worth of checks that are at the office but being delayed because the state lacks the money to pay them.”  The city of Naperville wants to increase property taxes, ignorantly claiming it’s necessary to “to take advantage of some of the EAV growth we’ve seen”!  What Naperville officials mean is that they’ve spent so much tax money on buying up and/or improving defunct properties/infrastructure that they now have to rape taxpayers for more money! What construction industry recovery? The city of Evanston revealed it is $6-million USD in the hole due to crashing revenues from lack of new building permits, and wants to counter by laying off 28 city employees and jacking up fees and property taxes!   Winnebago County Sheriff’s Police eliminating 80 jobs due to a $4-million USD cut in taxpayer funding.  The city of Oak Brook revealed a 5% decline in sales tax collections over a ten months period this year, compared to last year, but its blamed on one unnamed employer: “We had one company that had some exceptionally large contracts last year and are back to the norm this year. Those large contracts, which are not usual, accounted for the increase last year.”-Jason Paprocki

Indiana:  Indianapolis approved a budget that will see $13-million USD spent on expanding the city’s police-state operations, and $1-million supposedly to be spent on helping the hundreds of former Carrier employees who lost their jobs to Mexico (despite president Trump’s claims).   For this next story can you say ‘Government Scam!’? The city of Carmel approved a budget that increases across the board spending, including pay raises for ‘elected’ officials, all without raising taxes! It turns out that Carmel’s mayor is already the second highest paid in the state, and while state law allows for giving mayors raises that same law says you can’t ever reduce a mayor’s pay!    The city of South Bend approved a controversial budget for 2018, a budget opposed by the police union.  It creates a six figure salary for a new public safety director position directly controlled by the mayoral regime of Pete Buttigieg, as well as giving a handful of criminal investigators potential raises of as much as 48%: “That creates a lot of conflict and issues to say somebody’s going to get 10%, somebody’s going to get 20%. First of all, I’ve never seen a budget like that for the city. Secondly, it makes me uncomfortable … when everybody else is locked into 2%……”-David Varner, city council

Louisiana: The state mandates that city police and fire department employees get a mandatory 2% pay raise, however, most cities say they don’t have the local tax funding to comply.  Leaders with the City of Bossier City (yep, that’s the official name) claim they can comply with giving the state mandated 2% raise partly because their ObamaCare-ACA health insurance rates are not going up in 2018, due to the city switching insurance providers.  Despite sales tax collections for Shreveport being down the police-state mayor wants to hire more cops, increase overtime for cops, give cops and firefighters a 5% raise and spend at least $2-million USD on new police and fire department vehicles in 2018, because she claims crime is skyrocketing! Local news media revealed that the taxpayers of Shreveport have already paid for more than $5-million worth of new police vehicles since 2016! The police-state mayor didn’t explain how the money would be raised to pay for what she wants.    Leaders of New Iberia told their residents that taxpayer spending will increase in 2018 due to repairs/demolition of dilapidated buildings and the purchase of needed vehicles, resulting in a record budget deficit.  It was not explained how the money for the city projects would be raised.  One city leader says the economy has not recovered: “Unfortunately we’ve operated this way for the past four years. We’re waiting for the economy to get better. We are as strapped for cash as the parish and state.“-Freddie DeCourt, mayor

Michigan: More proof you shouldn’t rely on federal tax funding for your city budget; Saginaw didn’t get a hoped for $2-million USD FEMA-SAFER taxpayer funded grant and as such could layoff 13 firefighters and shutdown one fire station.  The city of Detroit being sued by the federal government for allowing the illegal posting of wall advertising, possibly in exchange for political contributions: “They’re bringing in and generating at least $100,000 a month, and you have to ask yourself, ‘Who’s profiting from these huge billboards?'”-Robert Davis, self-styled anti-corruption crusader

Mississippi: The city of Pearl warning of 16 layoffs due to “short-falling approximately a million dollars a year”.

Missouri:  The Kansas City Police chief is apparently blaming increased violence and lack of police response on lack of money and as such is demanding taxpayers fork-over an extra $9.3-million USD.  Isn’t that called extortion?

Montana:  State tax collections are so low that the gov’na’s budget office is projecting a $227-million USD shortfall, forcing the gov’na to cut state spending by 10%.

New Jersey: Gov’na Chris Christie willing to force cash-strapped taxpayers to give Amazon $7-billion USD in tax breaks over ten years if the online company sets up a secondary HQ in Newark!

New York: Poughkeepsie jacking up taxes for 2018 officially so they can hire more cops and buy more public safety crap, but don’t forget they got to pay a $2-million USD fine for violating Federal Transportation Administration rules!  The city leaders of Geneva proudly boasting that they didn’t raise the property tax rate for 2018, but they quietly jacked-up the water/sewer rates.   Jamestown Board of Public Utilities is in a ‘damned if you do, damned if you don’t’ situation as a result of jacking up rates as much as the state utility commission would allow in order to increase profits, which resulted in cash strapped customers using dramatically less electricity and water which resulted in profits actually falling, and now Jamestown BPU is facing a death spiral: “It is the law of diminishing returns. If you jack up water rates you see less usage.”–Sam Teresi, Jamestown mayor

New York Post reporting that the city of NYC’s budget is about to “explode”.    The same newspaper reporting that despite claims by leftist city and state officials that they’re cracking down on illegal payday loan ops in NYC, the illegal payday loan operations have skyrocketed, and target the poorest of the poor with interest charges of as much as 4-hundred percent:  “These bad lending practices are taking place in community centers, barber shops, dry cleaners and in other places people gather.”-Isaac Rodriguez, non-profit Provident Loan Society

North Carolina: In Charlotte, Catch on Seafood’s shutdown, the owner blaming never ending city road projects for causing a 60% crash in sales.

Ohio: An editorial in a local newspaper calls into question where the city of Toledo is getting its money.  After cash strapped residents voted down a proposed tax increase the city leaders suddenly ‘discovered’ millions of dollars in ‘forgotten’ accounts!  If the money is for real then it calls into question why the city officials wanted to jack-up taxes, or reveals massive incompetence.  The city of Middletown planning to increase taxpayer funding in 2018, paid for partly with a sewer rate hike.  It was also revealed that income tax collections were down by 3%, and that ObamaCare-ACA mandated employee health insurance payments were several years past due!   In Lima, after 25 years Just Ducky’s Gourmet Coffees, Foods & Unique Gifts shutdown due to ongoing road construction: “It really did destroy my business. It truly did.…People couldn’t get to me.”-Ducky Allen, owner

Oklahoma: The state Department of Health eliminating 250 jobs in early 2018, due to an audit that revealed the department has much less money that it officially reported!  This also implies even more layoffs will occur once the state approves the new greatly reduced taxpayer funded budget for next year.

Pennsylvania:  The city of Titusville being told it has to cut back on project spending in order to build up reserve funding for expected increases in ‘municipal minimum obligations’, such as a 13% increase in ObamaCare-ACA employee health insurance.

Puerto Rico:  After the leftist mainstream news media shit themselves over a $300-million USD no-bid contract to a Montana company to repair the island’s electrical grid, the gov’na now says the contract will be canceled as soon as ‘current’ work is completed.  New contracts will be sought with tax sucking companies in New York City and Florida.  Realize that the biggest populations of Puerto Ricans on the mainland are in NYC and Florida (meaning this is really about ‘racism’ on the part of the leftists), and I can almost guarantee you that the new contracts will end up costing taxpayers even more money!

Tennessee:  Taxpayers are being raped of $7.45-million USD as Nashville Metro is buying a vacant Kmart for the purpose of creating a massive police-state police precinct!   It’s been revealed that the blighted city of Memphis is putting all bets on economic recovery on taxpayer burdening apartment projects and piddly retail developments like a new Sears Hometown Store.  Sears Hometown stores typically employ less than a dozen people with part time hours at minimum wage.   Murfreesboro’s First United Methodist Church being turned into a shopping center, the church is now owned by city taxpayers (costing them $1.55-million USD) and the redevelopment will cost dumb taxpayers even more money.

Texas:  The American-Statesman discovered that a so called non-profit healthcare operation that was paid $1-million USD in taxpayer funding was actually created by an Austin city budget director!    The so called Latino HealthCare Forum got no-bid contracts under ObamaCare-ACA as a direct result of the soon to be former Austin city budget director Frank Rodriguez.   Rodriguez is resigning his post, conveniently blaming health problems!  The city of Sugar Land slashed its budget by $1.58-million due to the sales and property tax rates being increased by a much smaller than originally expected amount.  It’s also because existing sales and property tax collections crashed and burned in fiscal year 2017.  The result is that some employees will lose their jobs, city holiday events will be canceled as well as projects for the animal shelter, emergency operations center and second phase road construction. Next door city of Rollingwood jacked up property taxes to pay for ever expanding ‘projects’.    Despite the Corpus Christi city leaders jacking up property taxes (and despite residents voting to approve a new street tax), the operating hours of the Janet F. Harte Public Library are being reduced in order to free-up funding for unfinished road projects.

Utah: The A-hole Salt Lake City cop who arrested a nurse for protecting the Rights of an unconscious reserve policeman from Rigby, Idaho, has been fired.  The reserve cop from Idaho was burned over most of his body when a criminal being chased by the Salt Lake cops crashed head-on into the reserve cop’s semi-truck, causing a massive explosion.  For some odd reason the Salt Lake cop (a former paramedic who lost that job for discriminating against homeless people) demanded the nurse (a former Olympic athlete) take a blood sample from the unconscious reserve cop, in violation of Supreme Court ruling requiring a Warrant. When she refused he arrested her.  The reserve policeman from Idaho died from his burns.  The fired Salt Lake City cop is now suing, claiming he was unaware of the Supreme Court ruling!  (wouldn’t not understanding current laws mean he’s not competent to be a law enforcer?)

West Virginia:  The city leaders of Weston are boasting that their 2018 budget is already making money, no thanks to the increase they imposed on sales taxes.

Wisconsin:  Sun Prairie property owners are being hit with an average $57 USD property tax increase, and sewer rates are going up an average of $11. Sun Prairie leaders are also warning of job cuts despite revealing that some city departments had already shed jobs this past year.     It was revealed that during a closed-to-the-public meeting the ‘elected’ officials of the city of Brookfield discussed using a $6.55-million USD property tax funded grant to help redevelop the vacant Brookfield Square Sears, the money would be used for road construction and environmental cleanup of the site.  The city of Racine wants to increase property taxes and utility fees, possibly in connection with their ten years multi-million dollar infrastructure/property improvement project, and to create a new six figures salary for a new city attorney position to legally defend the improvements project!  Gives with one hand, takes away with the other; for the third time since 2011, Fort Atkinson City proposes to decrease city taxes, but will offset those cuts by jacking up city fees to fund increased capital expenditures.  The city budget of Beaver Dam is $360-thousand USD over the State Expenditure Restraint Program limits, partly due to a 13% increase in employee health insurance costs caused by ObamaCare-ACA.  The city of Green Bay is revealing major problems with animals.  Wis-ant residents are complaining about dogs at the farmer’s market, mainly because they’re scared of them!  But the real animal issue is the revelation that the city is being overrun with rats.  City leaders brushed it off saying “they’ve been here for a long time”, however, one pissed-off long-time resident, Janet Angus, told them “I’ve never had rats before in my neighborhood. It’s the first time in 50, 60 years!”

These Montana plated vans might soon have to pay for more expensive Wyoming plates!

Wyoming: Greedy state officials trying to squeeze more revenue out of vehicle owners.  The state Department of Transportation accusing as many as 3-thousand-5-hundred Yellowstone National Park employees of failing to register their vehicles in Wyoming, and failing to get Wyoming driver’s licenses.  Despite admitting that they don’t actually know how many private vehicles are not registered in Wyoming, money addicted officials claim they’re losing thousands of dollars per year due to lack of registration: “The U.S. government trucks are one thing, but the private vehicles that are up there all the time, and the Xanterra vehicles? I want to see Wyoming plates on those trucks!”-Bill Panos, WYDOT

And speaking of Yellowstone, the federal government made $20-thousand USD after two men from Illinois were arrested for drugs trafficking.  It was revealed that it happened during the Summer and the men pled guilty.  They were buying large quantities of legal marijuana in Oregon to be re-sold in Illinois where it’s illegal.

WARN=Worker Adjustment & Retraining Notification

Government Shenanigans, September 2017: “I’M NOT STUPID!” FAMOUS LAST WORDS OF A TAXPAYER FUNDED CEO

ObamaCare ACA Death Spiral, October 2017: “BUSINESS AS USUAL.”

Dumbing Down the U.S. of A., October 2017: “I’M BEING BULLIED!” “HE WAS SHOOTING AT TRUMP!”