Thursday, July 22, 2010

Mayor Rene Varela on the Financial Crisis in Lake Worth

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Mayor Rene Varela
no soft-soaping here

Lake Worth Mayor, Rene Varela, has come into his own. After nine months on the job, he has actually learned it and understands it, unlike so many past mayors or commissioners. He has delved into the problems and is completely cognizant of what needs to be done, in no uncertain terms. He admitted that he understood the challenges when he went into the job but obviously these problems were not a deterrent.

He expressed them all last night to a well attended Lake Worth Playhouse audience of residents and was 100% candid, a path I hoped he would take. This speech sets him apart from the typical politician and frankly, I was impressed with his candor. He delivered all the bad news in an eloquent but matter-of-fact way, still giving us hope to succeed.

Telling us that Lake Worth has been decimated over the past three years (actually it has been over the past decade or so) and a city that has been spending more than it takes in, he said that it took hard economic times to expose the inefficiencies and incompetence. He also said that the City is one bad hurricane or one bad law suit from bankruptcy, an exaggeration of major proportions but probably made to make a point.

He expressed concern that employees would have to sacrifice as "they work "tirelessly and endlessly," saying we had to end the financial madness now.

In full support of the city budget as presented by the City Manager, Susan Stanton, he said "this city budget stops the financial bleeding of the past." Wanting to implement a citywide volunteer board called Volunteer Lake Worth, he further stated that we are "at the end of a financial cliff," asking for commitment to volunteer boards as "citizens are our treasures."

"Chart a new path; fix the city budget; cut spending." Those are the desires of Mayor Varela and we can't agree more.
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1 comment:

  1. kkss21July 22, 2010 at 9:34 AM

    I'll tell you what has wrecked lake Worth-incompetent,and at worse ,criminal city staff.Past city Commissioners who tried to give away our beach,sell our parks,give away our water,opened up a land fill that was 5 years away from being valuable reclaimed land ,tried to make us slaves forever to the FMPA power association(Becky Matey,our utilities director is STILL trying to get us enslaved to FMPA )and got us into a rotten contract with the Sheriffs office that will bankrupt Lake Worth.A past CRA board that wasted MILLIONS on taking over two county roads as favors for their developer friends and backers.The everyday theft of millions in city equipment that nobody seems to know or care about.Giveaways of city property worth millions.The almost hijacking of our electrical system to the ridiculous and dangerous 26 KV. That little fiasco cost millions. The list goes on and on.And we the taxpayers continue to be ignored,belittled, and totally screwed by staff and our elected officials.

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