Holding Local Government Accountable: Pierce County 2017 Human Services pt.2

[meowzinator]

Update on my Pierce County Human Services Research

So, after spending countless hours trying to somehow sift through the Pierce County, Washington State website in order to find information about human services and community empowerment, I have finally had to just stop trying to find the information on my own. I cannot go much further without driving myself COMPLETELY INSANE. I am going to share with you some of the most alarming conclusions I came to through my own research, and the questions I will be asking my local government until I get some answers.

Reading Over the Pierce County 2018 Human Services Document

It almost makes me want to vomit. Please, bear with me. You may think i am being harsh and that Pierce County is some poor underfunded community, but I was appalled to find it is absolutely NOT. So let’s talk about the 2018 budget which is

324.9 million dollars wealthy.

First, most intriguing is the fact that instead of being planned yearly on some recorded and easily viewable schedule these meetings to discuss the public budget are held on November of 2017 without any public notification what-so-ever. Let me mention that last year at least from what I can find online, the hearings were some time around. April/May and the final hearing for public comment held in June. What efforts are being made to ensure those not employed by local government in Pierce County, are able to comment? How are they expected to know when the community is eligible to participate based on this system in place now?

They Taught us how to Format Documents in Highschool... These Files Aren’t Even Dated?

We discovered in my last post that Pierce County knows very well how to put together a website to increase business engagement (https://edbtacomapierce.org/); One, that is attractive, clear cut, and easy to follow. Why is it then that all of the county files are loosley formatted, and it is unclear where to find the date of adoption or proposal on many of these documents.
Pierce County even reports:

That is has received the Distinguished Budget Presentation Award from the Government Finance Officers Association for the Annual Budget since 1987, ‘meeting the highest principles of government budgeting’.
But here, we DO NOT see that reflected in the 2018 budget presentation powerpoint slideshow.


I was making better powerpoint presentations about Tupac when I was in the 5th grade.


Is there something I am missing here?

71 Million Dollars for Human Services? Without a Citizen Participation Plan?

This is probably my key issue and reason for outrage is an issue of accountability. It seems as though many of these documents which are supposed to be made available for public record, have gone up without much care or concern. As if the county already knows nobody will be checking, and if they do... well, good luck with that. Considering the consolidated plan for P.C 2015-2019 even goes so far as to list for every section the Code of Federal Regulations Policies it is supposed to be meeting, and clearly skips out on many of the CFR requirements. For example, CFR 91.200(c) states:


So why is it that the Pierce County Consolidated Plan document only contains this:

As it's citizen participation plan?

Totally left out any intentions to change the plan for the future or to ensure the public is more involved with the community development process moving forward. With a 71 million dollar budget, you would think that any plans for public participation would be possible. Not to mention how many millions are spent on administrative services for Pierce County... I mean I have made FREE community engagement strategies for OHM back last summer, this kind of shit is pretty unacceptable.

How can you justify 71 million dollars on human services, and literally no resources for citizen participation? What would even be the point of that?

To get my questions answered, I am planning to email and call several people from the Pierce County Human Services department and from wherever else I can find that might be able to sit down and chat with me a bit about these issues I have discovered. Whether I am able to speak to someone in person, over email or over the phone, I will be keeping a record of it on Steemit to finally start holding the responsible parties accountable(I hope) and also to gain feedback and help others who might be thinking about standing up to their local policymakers as well.

What are your thoughts, beliefs, opinions, or experiences with local government? What do you think about what I have found so far? What questions would you have? Any feedback as always is greatly appreciated. Also be on the lookout for ICC as our first project implementation initiates in January 2018!

Comments

[finnian]

Rule by council is tyrannical by design. People hate HoA's but somehow try to justify county and city councils. They don't want your participation. All they want is your property and compliance. Give us your taxes, and do as you're told! We are better than you, and we have the police, judges, and entire system on our side. Good luck fighting us and our rich oligarchs.

[meowzinator]

Yes but the trick is, WE pay their salaries. They get rich off of the assumption that nobody in the community they are feeding off of will pay attention or take notice because they are so busy working to make it day-to-day, they have no time to be involved in community services or local government. Imagine Conscious Collective looks to make conscious use of ALL existing and emerging technologies. If the public were paying attention, they would be outraged. As of right now, from a citizen point of view being involved with local government is a waste of time. But now, with blockchain and cryptocurrency and STEEMIT we can argue against that and work to do better than existing infrastructures by incentivized participation and reporting.

[finnian]

It would be a lot cheaper that way too. We might even be able to have governance without theft. /gasp Wouldn't that be nice?!

[meowzinator]

Lets get it done dude!

[mitneb]

Can you say, "Agenda 21", @meowzinator? I'm guessing that a little research in that direction will give you an idea of why you are finding these strange and inexcusable things. Your area is not alone.

I've upvoted and resteemed this post, and am following you now. I found the link to this article on #unmentionables.

As disturbing as it is, Communitarianism, and Agenda 21 is already established all across America.

Keep us informed about what you find if you do dig deeper.

Cheers!
@mitneb

[meowzinator]

Thanks so much for reading and following and your support means so much! I think it is possible to stop this, by getting involved and reporting to the public as well as relaying to individuals why issues like this matter. Looking up agenda 21 never have heard of it before now. I followed and will be sure to go over your content as well. Again, I am loving the feedback and support. You bet I will keep you informed and I fully intend to dig as deep as I possibly can. I am hoping that when people become aware, they will begin to speak out and join together to take action against problems like this. Thank you so much!

[mitneb]

You're welcome, @meowzinator! I'm glad you are going to pursue this, and I will be really interested in reading what you find out. I agree with you that if enough people protest, the tide can be turned. The problem is that the Agenda 21 propaganda has been in place in our public school curriculum for long enough now that the current college age generation has already been indoctrinated, and accept it as the best way to live. So we are fighting our children, and their sense of what's right in so many ways.

I'm not saying that people shouldn't do something to try to roll it back, but it's much bigger than changing politicians or a few laws.

It's sad.
@mitneb

[olyup]

What a sad situation.

It is nice to see someone talking about local (sort of) politics here though.