Let the bells ring, let the fireworks fly. It’s the newsmaker of the year: Rick Caruso! What a resounding way to close out the year.
The Glendale News-Press could not have chosen better. In the year when American car-makers’ chief executives stretched out their arms for a handout, we celebrate what may be California’s premier subsidy-seeker — Caruso Affiliated — as the epitome of American business acumen. It’s so appropriate that no cynical scriptwriter could have come up with a better year-end recognition.
Take a trolley ride to Tiffany’s, and short-change our schools. Sound preposterous? The sad tale lost to so many Glendale taxpayers is that the tax money used to purchase land given over to the Americana at Brand came from money that would have gone to the county of Los Angeles. Redevelopment money comes from property tax money that could have gone to reduce our state deficit. The city is allowed to keep it so it can hand it out to entice developers’ interests. Bring out those schoolchildren who will leave those crowded classrooms to play at the Americana’s playground. It’s your tax dollars at work. It’s the ultimate absurdity of good intentions gone awry. The city councilmen claim that the extra sales tax and property tax will be a boon for the city. But they hand out the increased income in the form of extra pay and benefits to over-pampered city managers. The shortage is taken from Glendale Water & Power and the capital improvement fund. So long tax revenues, hello deficits.
