"What was that?" I asked

"It is my new GPS system. I spend so many weekends in New York City and in Buffalo partying that it became a necessity."

Of course I found it strange that anyone who was living off of unemployment and borrowing money from whoever would give it to him could consider a GPS system a necessity.

I am sure many of you have had the same odd experience. A friend or relative who only calls when they need money for food even though they had gone out drinking the previous weekend or they can’t pay their electric bill but they have enough money to buy cigarettes. I am sure most of you are wise enough to distinguish between the hard working father of four and the young kid who blows all of his money on God only knows what. If they are really good at the game they may claim they have expenses related to the care of their elderly family members or sick children.

When the money grubbing person calls you have a couple of options. You can give them money with a speech about priorities in the hopes they will learn their lesson or you can just say no and send them on their merry way since the relationship is obviously a losing proposition. I chose the latter option.

It is sad to say but people like my former colleague always find some sucker willing to hand over money and they never seem to learn their lesson until they are cut off. It kind of reminds me of our current county leadership. They have enough money coming in but they blow it on mileage reimbursements, pay raises much larger than the cost of living, overtime, county vehicles for out of county travel and the most dangerous of all, poor financial planning that is nothing short of incompetence.

The suckers that keep letting the spenders get away with it are the voters who re-elect these guys, or at the very least, do not protest when the county blows money. If the county legislature was a board of directors of a major corporation they would have been driven out by stockholders and if the Chief Administrative Officer were a CEO he would have been fired before he released the preliminary budget.

Regrettably our county government is not run like a sound business. It does not have to show a profit and if it needs more money it simply raises taxes and blames someone or something else for their predicament and as long as we are willing to hand them over money they will keep calling on us to do so in order to pay for their new cars and the expensive political favors. Or we can just hang up the phone and delete the number.