Clay's Letters to the Editor

Do yourself a favor: Vote no on the jail referendum

The Daily Chronicle, (DeKalb, IL) November 4, 2006

Editor:

To the people of DeKalb County:

This Election Day you have the unusual privilege of deciding whether to allow your county government to raise your taxes. You will actually get to decide whether you agree to become poorer. If you vote yes on the public safety referendum, $4 million a year will be removed from the pockets of those who spend their money in this county, which is, of course, all of us. If you vote no, if you are to believe those trying to extract this coin from your purse, we will have to continue to ship our overflow inmates to other counties at great cost and inconvenience. The attempt to raise your taxes in this fashion failed before, presumably because most of us already feel overtaxed. So in this golden age of Illinois politics, when trust abounds in our elected officials, the attempt to lighten your wallet is here again. For those entire still on the fence, consider the following:

1. In the last decade, our county board has spent more than $250 million, a quarter of a billion dollars of your tax money, without solving this dilemma. During this time, the county farm property has spun off millions of dollars in new revenue. Despite these massive expenditures, and despite study of this problem for 16 years, the best solution the board members have come up with is to raise your taxes.

2. And all along not one dime has been set aside in a fund to build a new jail. In fact, your county board currently does not have any permanent fund set aside for vital capital expenditures like a new jail. They rely on raising your taxes for any such improvements - a “pay as you go” policy unheard of in most governments and businesses. Is implementing a new sales tax really the new vehicle to pay for public works since our real estate taxes are already astronomical?

3. No effort has been made to ascertain precisely the reason for the overcrowding. There are many other aspects of the criminal justice system that affect your jail population - your court system, prosecutors' office and circuit clerk. Over the last five years these departments have sharply increased their budgets without a commensurate rise in efficiency. Without these problems being solved, the size of your jail is irrelevant.

4. The county board that is now asking you to agree to pay more taxes is the same august body that last year sent four of its members, along with County Administrator Ray Bockman, on an all-expenses-paid trip to Hawaii. Pardon me if I am skeptical of them finding a solution to our jail problem in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.

Most of the time that our taxes get raised, we get no say in it. Springfield just dials in another dime on each gallon of gas, or packet of cigarettes, or carton of milk, and we pay it. Most of us don't mind paying taxes if we believe they will be spent wisely. In this case, however, voting for passage of this public safety referendum will only serve to reward the wasteful mismanagement of our county board and its various departments over the last decade. Do yourself and your neighbors a favor - vote no. Go spend the money on your kids. You will get a return on that investment.

CLAY CAMPBELL

DeKalb County Board candidate

District 8

Get involved in your community

The Daily Chronicle, (DeKalb, IL) September 24, 2004

Editor:

The next four years will be a challenging time for the next DeKalb County state's attorney

The rapid growth that we will continue to experience will place increasing demands on all aspects of local government, particularly our criminal justice system. Each new subdivision brings new problems, and new problems require innovative and cost-effective solutions. A weekend drive through the suburbs of Chicago is all one needs to see what happens to a once-tranquil community when it is overrun by urban sprawl.

Traffic congestion, school overcrowding and exorbitant tax burdens are just a few of the telltale signs that the challenges of growth are upon us.

I urge all people to get involved in their local communities. We are all in the same boat. Only through active participation in our local governments can we avail ourselves of the talent and intelligence of our people. We must find new ways to make our streets safer as they are increasingly becoming dangerous thoroughfares where red lights and speed limits are no longer respected. We shouldn't have to risk our lives going to the post office or grocery store. We must find new ways to make our schools safer from the dangers facing our children, particularly the deadly drugs like methamphetamine and Ecstasy that have recently surfaced in the area. The death of a child is far too high a price to pay for our apathy.

These solutions must come without raising our real estate taxes. Growth is good only if it allows us to continue to afford our homes. I pledge that as our next state's attorney I will personally involve myself in coming up with solutions to these pressing problems. I will hold town hall meetings around the county to get input from residents on the dangers they see and the solutions they propose. I will visit the schools and talk to the students, particularly the high school students, about the dangers of abusing their privileges to drive a car and the perils of drug use. As the public official who will prosecute them if they violate the law, I feel that I will be in a particularly powerful position to state my case.

Direct personal involvement by all county residents, and all public officials, is the path we must continue to walk down. It's effective and it's free. Get to know your community. Get involved.

CALVIN CLAY CAMPBELL

Republican candidate for DeKalb County state's attorney