Tax Expenditures in Richardson

Tax expenditures: spending by another name.

A tax expenditure program is government spending through the tax code. Tax expenditures alter the horizontal and vertical equity of the basic tax system by allowing exemptions, deductions, or credits to select groups or specific activities. For example, two people who earn exactly the same income can have different effective tax rates if one of the tax payers qualifies for certain tax expenditure programs by owning a home, having children, and receiving employer health care and pension insurance.

Source: Wikipedia.

It's understandable why Congress has grown so attached to tax expenditures. It's a way to spend without blame. In fact, Congress is more likely to take credit for reducing taxes.

That's Washington. How about Richardson?

S2L77: Across Afghanistan

Afghanistan
March 26-27, 1977
Empty land. A few mud villages, including sleepy Ghazni.
Kandahar was unremarkable.
We stopped for camel rides at some nomad's tent.
The bus ran out of gas.

Source: Personal travel notes.

From 1977 03 23 Afghanistan

More after the jump.

How to Survive a Plague (2012)

IMDB

How to Survive a Plague (2012): History of movement to get govt to accelerate AIDS research as millions died. Forgotten today. Our loss. B+

Public Hearing on Richardson's Budget

Richardson's 2012-2013 budget forecast was balanced in the common usage sense of the word (revenues exceeded expenditures). The currently estimated budget actuals are not balanced in the common usage sense (expenditures exceed revenues), but by drawing down fund balances (by about $3 million!) the budget actuals are "balanced" in some bureaucratic sense that I still don't claim to fully understand.

Anyway, now it's on to 2013-2014. After the jump, another way to measure success.

2013-2015 Near-term Action Items

I expected to write this blog post about the near-term action items decided upon by the Richardson City Council during two meetings held August 14 and August 17, 2013. The meetings (retreats?) were held away from city hall. I couldn't make it (my bad - I was sleeping in at the time the second meeting started at 7:45 a.m. on Saturday). Audio and video from the meetings are not posted on the city's website (yet?). Written minutes are not available (yet?).

So, unless you were physically in the audience (at the Eisemann Center, not city hall) you're probably just as much in the dark about what transpired at these meetings as I am. But maybe I know why they called these meetings a "retreat." They were a retreat from transparency in government.