It’s not a competition

The recent article regarding the regional mental health board’s “crisis” to spend down their state funding touched on my opinion, but it’s important to explain further.

The mental health region is certainly not the only board who views spend-down requirements as a problem. The state sets guidelines on what percentage of funding you can carry over without a reduction in next year’s allocation.

Why? If these boards don’t use all the funding, they must not need it. At least that’s what common sense would say.

However, many of these boards furiously, and sometimes frivolously, find projects to spend down their funds to meet the state requirements. The goal is to spend as much money as possible and avoid it going to a statewide fund others can draw from.

They see it as a competition to keep funding in their area and not in others. In the example of mental health, if another region needs more funding to complete projects to provide essential services, I don’t see the problem.

These boards need to see the larger picture of what is best for all Iowan’s across the state, not just their area.

This isn’t just a state issue. Competition has polluted local government too. Counties look to the state and try to keep up with salaries and infrastructure. Counties are constantly comparing to each other and “trying to keep up with the Joneses.”

Even cities are frequently trying to compete with county to retain employees and programming. While competition might breed competence/excellence in the business world, it raises your taxes in government.

When one entity raises the bar, it causes a waterfall effect. A wise friend in government once told me, “If we don’t start collaborating, we are all going to fail.” I can’t agree more.

The state, counties and cities need to examine where we have duplication of services and find ways to collaborate. There are so many resources and manpower to share, helping reduce everyone’s budget.

It’s time we forget the selfish mentality and look toward helping out one another. This is why I support the new property tax relief legislation.

When money wasn’t limited, local government could raise their budgets to compete with other entities. I think limiting property tax growth will foster more conversation on collaboration between counties and cities.

I personally hope to pursue some of these ideas in Iowa County and follow through on my campaign of property tax relief.