[Mpls] My Candidacy for Mayor

[Mark Snyder]

On 9/1/05 7:39 AM, "gemgram" <gemgram at mn.rr.com> wrote:

> Mark says, "I'd really love to hear from Commissioner McLaughlin or his
> supporters on what they would have done differently."
> 
> I believe we have been giving that information to you for the last two
> years.  Perhaps Mark, like RT, does not remember that.  Readers, please go
> back and review the archives, and you will find that that for a couple of
> years we defended RT, and then we started urging RT to remember some of his
> promises.  Then you will find some of us blaming his appointees and not RT.
> Only after it became obvious that the Rybak administration was organizing
> against neighborhoods and absolutely did not care about the "Impacted
> Neighborhoods" did RT himself come under criticism.

No, Jim. You haven't been giving us that information.

What you've been doing is a lot of complaining about what you don't like
from Mayor Rybak, but you've done very little suggesting what should have
been done differently that would have enabled us to pay for the additional
cops, NRP funding and various other things you want.

For that matter, neither has McLaughlin. The latest mumblings I've seen was
something about slowing down debt repayment, which would in turn threaten
the city's bond rating. That's a brilliant idea! Make it even harder for the
city to get out of debt...

I realize that accounting and budgets makes people's eyes glaze over, but
it's really not rocket science. Look at your checkbook - see those line
items you have for your Visa or Master Card? Unless you're paying off your
balance in full every month, much of that monthly payment you make is for
interest on money you've borrowed, especially if you're just making the
minimum payment. The money you're paying in interest every month is money
you cannot spend on sprucing up your yard, repainting a bedroom or whatever,
unless you want to go into additional debt by charging more on your credit
card. 

On a city level, the money being paid for interest on our debt cannot be
used for adding cops or funding NRP. If we want to do those things, we
either need to pay down the debt we've accumulated, like Mayor Rybak's
administration is doing, cut spending elsewhere, like Mayor Rybak's
administration has done, as evidenced by all the city departments actually
sticking to their budgets for the first time in recent memory.

Or, we could go back to the charge card days of SSB and simply push the
tough decisions onto future generations. That seems to be the McLaughlin
plan. If I'm wrong, then show me.

Show me McLaughlin's five-year budget plan that shows how he's going to pay
for the extra cops he's promised, pay for the NRP funding he's promised and
pay for everything else he's promised (and there's a lot). McLaughlin
portrays himself as this experienced politician going up against the
political novice. Surely it should be no problem for him to produce a
proposed budget that details how he's going to pay for all the promises he's
made.

> My memory is getting bad so perhaps someone can remind me, besides RT's
> special interests, Sabri and powerful lawyers, who else supports RT?

Here you go, Jim.

http://rtrybak.com/index.asp?Type=B_BASIC&SEC={3475F95D-3A90-4CA0-96FE-10D49
F38A1EA}

# Democracy for America
# The Sierra Club
# Former Vice President Walter Mondale
# U.S. Senator Mark Dayton
# Former Governor Wendell Anderson
# Former State Attorney General Warren Spannaus
# Former State Auditor Judi Dutcher
# Hennepin County Attorney Amy Klobuchar
# County Commissioner Mike Opat
# County Commissioner Gail Dorfman
# Council Member Barbara Johnson
# Council Member Paul Ostrow
# Council Member Don Samuels
# Council Member Lisa Goodman
# Council Member Scott Benson
# Council Member Barret Lane
# Council Member Paul Zerby
# Former Council Member Barbara Carlson
# State Senator Jane Ranum
# State Senator Scott Dibble
# Former State Senator Allan Spear
# Former State Senator George Pillsbury
# Representative Keith Ellison
# Representative Margaret Anderson-Kelliher
# Representative Frank Hornstein
# Representative Paul Thissen
# Representative Jean Wagenius
# Former Representative Len Biernat
# School Board Chair Joe Erickson
# School Board Member Lydia Lee
# School Board Member Audrey Johnson
# Former School Board Chair Catherine Shreves
# Former School Board Member Al Gallmon

Who else finds it interesting that McLaughlin's most prominent DFL
colleagues at Hennepin County (Opat, Dorfman and Klobuchar) all support
Rybak for mayor? 

What does that say about McLaughlin that the folks you'd expect would know
him best from working with him closely for so many years aren't supporting
his campaign?

Mark Snyder
Windom Park