budget
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Montgomery County Paid Something Called “Energy Audits and Green Solutions, LLC” $3.31 Million in 2020: What Exactly Was It For?
Read more: Montgomery County Paid Something Called “Energy Audits and Green Solutions, LLC” $3.31 Million in 2020: What Exactly Was It For?Montgomery County appears to have a transparency issue with how it discloses its vendor information to the general public or those seeking more details from the data and county spending source(s) housed at spending.data.montgomerycountymd.gov. As Mr. Reardon “Sully” Sullivan (a former candidate for Montgomery County Executive) has documented, “as all organizations must do, the Montgomery County…
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Investor Beware: MoCo Govt Issues More General Obligation Bonds as ‘Debt Servicing’ Projects
Read more: Investor Beware: MoCo Govt Issues More General Obligation Bonds as ‘Debt Servicing’ ProjectsMoCo debt service cost are on a glide path to consume more and more resources in budgets that should be going into the actual MoCo body politic.
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Economic Storm Clouds Are Gathering, But the Montgomery County Council Seems Pre-Occupied with Other (National) Topics
Read more: Economic Storm Clouds Are Gathering, But the Montgomery County Council Seems Pre-Occupied with Other (National) TopicsEconomic storm clouds are gathering for the nation’s economy, and Montgomery County will not be immune to an economic recession. The combination of high debt burdens (consumer, corporate, and government), still too-high inflation, high energy costs and higher interest rates are slowing economic growth to a trickle, and potentially feeding a cycle of yet more…
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The 2024 Budget Vote, When the Reformers Failed Us
Read more: The 2024 Budget Vote, When the Reformers Failed UsAndrew Friedson is by far a more compassionate, thoughtful, and caring member of the County Council than its progressive members, and CM Marilyn Balcombe has earned well deserved credibility as an advocate for a much neglected up-county population. Tragically, when it came to their votes for the 2024 budget, both let us down. Before we…
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MoCo Retiree Healthcare Plan (“Post Employment Benefits”) is Badly Under-Funded
Read more: MoCo Retiree Healthcare Plan (“Post Employment Benefits”) is Badly Under-FundedMontgomery County’s Consolidated Retiree Health Benefits Trust (the fund used to pay out retiree healthcare expenses for former MCPS and Montgomery College employees, among other county retirees) is under-water and has less then 50% of the assets needed to satisfy projected liabilities/claims in the years ahead, per official reporting issued by Montgomery County government and…
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The Property Tax Hike Rebellion
Read more: The Property Tax Hike RebellionLet’s talk about the 10% increase in property tax (aka, “10 cent revenue enhancement”) supposedly to fund MCPS. Montgomery County demographics are largely Democrats, and much of the workforce is in government, contracting, and hospitality industries. Many would ordinarily support paying more for the schools. (Not to diminish the real burden this places on retirees…
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The MCPS Budget Numbers They Don’t Want You To See
Read more: The MCPS Budget Numbers They Don’t Want You To SeeWith budget discussions well underway, the hot topic is additional funding for Montgomery County Public Schools. Sparked by a controversial proposal to raise property taxes by 10% to provide the additional funding, the unions and union backed politicians are out in full force advocating for it being a necessity. Their argument is that MCPS is…
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Claw back the Improperly Issued Income Tax Offset Credits (ITOC)
Read more: Claw back the Improperly Issued Income Tax Offset Credits (ITOC)The Montgomery County Council invited submissions of testimony related to the FY24 Budget on April 13, 2023. One resident, Louis Wilen, submitted testimony and supporting documents that make a strong case for the County to recover over $100 million in improperly issued Income Tax Offset Credits (ITOC). Mr. Wilen is no stranger to identifying fiscal…
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Montgomery County Spent Millions of “American Rescue Plan Act” Funds on Things That Had Nothing to Do with Covid Mitigation or “Resilience”
Read more: Montgomery County Spent Millions of “American Rescue Plan Act” Funds on Things That Had Nothing to Do with Covid Mitigation or “Resilience”A review of information at both Treasury.gov and MarylandTaxes.gov reveals that Montgomery County politicians spent millions of future taxpayer dollars allocated to it via the so-called ‘American Rescue Plan Act’ (ARPA) on things that had nothing to do with Covid-19 disease mitigation or ‘resilience’. The final portion of this funding (via the Federal Government’s largesse…
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As Montgomery County Faces Recession Pressures and Uncertainty, Marc Elrich Departs for Taiwan with Member of County Council
Read more: As Montgomery County Faces Recession Pressures and Uncertainty, Marc Elrich Departs for Taiwan with Member of County CouncilTen days after revealing his “recommended” fiscal year 2024 budget for Montgomery County, Maryland, that includes big tax hikes via property tax rates, County Executive Marc Elrich is departing for business and “international smart city” representation in Taiwan. Does it reflect someone concerned about County finances? On March 15, 2023, CE Marc Elrich put out a…