The 2007 election is over and the results are pretty much a done deal. I was glad to see that the Hospitality Tax increase went down in flames. The sour grapes crowd is already complaining about future problems funding parks and recreation. With the better part of two years left to put an acceptable proposal before the voters, the moaning on their part is a bit premature. I think the proposal went down for two reasons. First voters found the 25% tax increase to be unacceptable, and most thought the existing 2% tax should be sufficient. The other reason that the proposal went down was the language about the future community/events center. I think the majority of voters feel that the City of Yuma should not be getting involved in a commercial project such as the proposed arena deal with Global Entertainment. City officials are already looking to alternative funding sources despite the message sent by voters regarding the events center. So what is new! The City of Yuma is famous for ignoring the will of the citizenry.

The city council really dodged a bullet by the narrow defeat of perennial gadfly Jack Kretzer for councilman. The city council incumbents and city officials should see the votes that Jack did receive as a warning that Yuma’s citizens are no longer going to sit back and let the council do what ever they want at the expense of taxpayers. It should be clear by now that Yuma residents are unhappy with the past actions of the council and expect better from their elected officials.

I was a bit disappointed to see the pay increase for the mayor and council was defeated. I felt that a pay increase might attract a better quality of candidates for these positions. As it stands now, the pay is so low that many otherwise good candidates cannot afford to serve. The result is that those with a vested interest in the actions of the mayor and council are the ones that are running for office. Perhaps with a pay increase for the mayor and council, the decisions made by these official would be to benefit the city instead of their own pocket books. Unfortunately, I think the voters said to themselves “Why should I give these idiots a raise when they do such a poor job”. Perhaps this was a bit short sided, but is another indication of the displeasure of the voters with the existing city power base.