Seneca County Unfair

(Ah yes, Scout the computer challenged has appeared!)

For years the Seneca County Fair has experienced a myriad of problems including lower attendance, diminished exhibitors, and a solid reputation for treating newly elected directors with innovative ideas shabbily until such time as they give up and quit. One of my favorite stories involves the director who attempted to vote for the director’s election.

The director’s hold office on a staggered basis and therefore elections are held to vote on these offices. Well it seems one fellow director showed up to vote, but didn’t have his membership card handy. Now the goofs running the election could have just looked up his number in the book, but instead they told him he wasn’t allowed to vote! It’s a damn director on the fairboard for pete’ sake and they couldn’t be bothered. Well the director couldn’t be bothered to work with such a group either, and tendered his resignation. Good for him.

But this year they stooped to new lows. For many a year, the boy scouts loaded up a wagon with cold, bottled water and pulled it along to merchants, etc. so they could buy a drink and not have to leave their booth. (The fairboard expects your booth to be manned at all times.) The boy scouts didn’t exactly make a killing on this bit of entrepreneurship, but it pulling in about $150.00. Not this year, by gawd. They were told it wasn’t fair to the other food vendors, of which the fair board added six more this year making the fair grounds wall to wall food vendors.

In protest one merchant, a good fellow who coincidentally is an advocate for scouting, vowed never to return to the fair. I vowed to write this story so that folks would know about this incident. So this is our unfair board, out to put those bad, boy scouts in their place. Good Grief.

PS. If you can, drop the scouts off a buck or two because I am their advocate too.

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A sincere artist is not one who makes a faithful attempt to put on to canvas what is in front of him, but one who tries to create something which is, in itself, a living thing… William Dobell

Now THIS is an idea for revenue…

Ohioans ticketed for parking in own driveways

Tue Jun 16, 6:52 am ET

TOLEDO, Ohio – Residents of Toledo, Ohio, are complaining that they received $25 tickets for parking their vehicles in their own driveways.

Mayor Carty Finkbeiner (FINK’-by-ner) says he stands by the citations handed out last week by the Division of Streets, Bridges and Harbor. He says the tickets were issued under a city law against parking on unpaved surfaces, including gravel driveways.

During a news conference Monday, Finkbeiner ignored a reporter’s question of whether the crackdown and fines were related to the city’s budget crisis.

The three-term mayor faces a recall vote in November. Critics have claimed he’s wasted city money.

City Councilman D. Michael Collins calls the ticketing “Mickey Mouse nonsense.” He has told residents he’ll try to have the citations rescinded.

Governor Stickland’s dirty little secret.

Let’s pretend you are short on cash. You just don’t have as much money coming in as you are used to having, because business has slowed down. Understandable. So you have to make some difficult choices to change how you conduct your business. Maybe you have to lay-off employees, or cut-back on the services your business offers. However, there is another part of your business that you dare not touch. State sales tax in, state sales tax out – it goes straight to the Ohio coffers. Don’t pay, or juggle the money and it is considered defrauding the state of Ohio. Way big problems if you decide to go that route. Fines, more fines, court costs, attorneys, liens, name dragged through mud. So you don’t go there.

But way if you ARE The State of Ohio?

Well obviously the rules don’t apply to YOU. The great state of Ohio receives enormous amounts of money from the federal government to fund various programs. This money is sometimes channeled through state bureaucracy – as in the case of social security monies intended for the care of the disabled. The state of Ohio has hundreds of private agencies that care for individuals with disabilities. Some are residential facilities, others are providers who help with meaningful employment, and the like. These providers employee thousands of people to help provide services for the less fortunate. The providers then pay their employees, bills, etc. for this care. The federal government sends this money to the states, and the states then disperse this money after the providers send in their billing for services.  The state then distributes those funds to the providers in a timely fashion. WHOAAA.

Did I say timely fashion? Silly me. I should say whenever they damn well feel like it.  One week the state employee who disperses these funds was on vacation. SO THE STATE JUST DIDN’T PAY UNTIL THE EMPLOYEE RETURNED FROM VACATION.  Other times they state sends the reimbursements out late, and refuses to divulge the reason. Think this is a rare occurrence? Think again. I know folks in the business who have put up with this crap for years. Now just think how much money do you think the state of Ohio fails to disperse on time? Millions. How much other federal money do they hold onto? The state has yet to disperse the federal stimulus summer jobs for youth dollars to Seneca county, and we are half-way through JUNE! I believe that is a cool quarter of a million right there. Now just what do you suppose the interest on millions of dollars runs a day?

So the next time you are having a tough time of it and are tempted to cut a few corners, just sign yourself up to be the 51st state. It sure seems to work for Ohio.

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What is going on at the Seneca County Auditor’s Office???

Why are the taxpayers of Seneca county paying for an in-house attorney at the auditor’s office? The prosecutor’s office is legal counsel to the auditor, if we are not mistaken. If we are in a financial fiasco, why is this happening? Has the A-T written anything about this absurb set-up?