April 17, 2008 06:20 am Members of the U.S. Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship were listening when Gloucester Mayor Carolyn Kirk testified yesterday in Washington. She was speaking directly to them, after all. And her main focus was what the credit crunch is doing to small-business owners — those she described as the economic backbone of the city. But one has to hope that other members of Congress were listening as well, particularly those responsible for the federal budget, when she spoke of the unbearable fiscal burden of unfunded mandates. Gloucester is under orders to make improvements to its sewer and water systems that are going to cost tens of millions of dollars, and send rates for those services to unprecedented levels. As Kirk indicated in yesterday's testimony, the city can no longer afford to pay for school athletic programs out of its operating budget because it is spending so much of its money on federally mandated education programs. Environmental improvements and education are both very important things. But members of Congress must realize that it doesn't help the environment or education if they drive communities into bankruptcy. They cannot simply pass feel-good legislation and then, in effect, tell the communities responsible for abiding by it, "you figure out how to pay for it." Everybody wants more than they have, but have to limit their acquisitions to what they can afford. Those at the federal level need to do the same thing — and it shouldn't take a reminder from a Gloucester mayor.
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