The Great State of Foxxobertsburg
What could possibly go wrong? I mean aside from having two dysfunctional government entities merged into one with more consolidated power and authority, more and greater reach and scope, and more sprawling bureaucracy with less transparency and efficiency?
City/County consolidation, despite professions to the contrary, isn’t about saving taxpayer dollars by shrinking government, at least not as it currently exists. The notion of eliminating scores of positions and departments that might have some degree of overlap is fallacy. Government does not shrink unless and until it flat runs out of money, and coercive taxing authority usually assures it does not.
Similarly, consolidation isn’t about better representation. The feudal towns surrounding the Queen City already have enough of their tax dollars funneled into funding largely Charlotte-centric projects, thank you very much; pitchforks would likely be at the ready if consolidation forced even more of their treasure into that same trough, along with dismantling their own governing autonomies as an added bonus.
Anybody who thinks the power base of a city/county merger wouldn’t rest comfortably in the lap of uptown Charlotte is self-delusional. Take a look at where a majority of shiny new trinkets already land and where so-called smart growth is concentrating services; hint – it ain’t Pineville or Mint Hill. Consolidation would be yet another weapon wielded, quite aggressively in this case, in an ongoing war against the suburbs.
While fiscal savings can be had through consolidation, arguably by taking advantage of economies of scale and spreading fixed costs over a larger base, the argument loses potency when the entities to merge are equally inept at their assigned tasks. In that instance, the end result yields little but a larger organization with too many employees trying to provide too many services to too many people, producing waste and mediocrity instead of improved efficiency and superior product.
I have seen nothing over the last decade, from either the governments of Charlotte or Mecklenburg, which leads me to believe that wouldn’t be the case for a city/county merger. Ask yourself: do you think better outcomes or greater odds for wholesale disaster would result from merging the braintrust that brought you an empty racing museum and a bankrupt train system with the gang of wizards that brought you a whitewater park flooded in debt and a balance sheet bleeding red ink?
It’s like creating a leadership team with the captain of the Titanic and the pilot of the Hindenburg.
If you want better results from Charlotte and Mecklenburg County government, the way to go about getting it is to elect better leaders; not by giving the same ones more power and control. Get a majority of fiscally responsible politicians behind the dais, and then we can have a realistic debate on the merits of consolidation.
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