From The Trough - A View From the City's Coffers

By Penny Beancounter |

As we cast our gaze to the city coffers for the month of March, we find some interesting checks that have been paid. It is not too far of a stretch to say that government cash payments are the lifeline of many businesses, and to the politicians, the zeros and decimal points eventually become a blur.

Perusing the monthly check payments on Elk Grove City Council Agenda Item No 8.1, we see $40,164 (check no.6839) paid to our City Attorney's law firm. If March is a typical month and extrapolating that for the entire year, it works out to over $482,000, not counting the cost of the other City-paid staff attorneys. Speaking of law firms, it looks like we paid out over $257,000 to The Veen Firm. The Veen Firm web site states they are an injury and liability law firm out of San Francisco (check 71783) -- wonder what background surrounds this apparent settlement?

Man does not live on bread alone. How about $4,000 being paid to the Fresh and Easy grocery store (check 72048). Either there is a lot of eating going on at City Hall, or maybe this is one of those "economic development incentives"? And speaking of sustenance, we paid $39,201 to the California Employment Development Department. Sounds like unemployment checks for past workers?

If you eat hard, you must exercise to work it off. How about $1,500 we paid to the Laguna Creek Racquet Club. (Check 72052) Healthy government includes being able to swing a mean racquet when the going gets tough.

And speaking of tough times, poor old Elk Grove Buick/GMC was paid a measly .03 cents for something! (check 72181) The stamp cost more than that!