Letters to the Editor

Are we really

saving money?

To the Editor:

We've all been there; someone walks in with something new. You ask: How much was that? Then the answer comes: I saved a lot of money.

They then explain how it used to be $500 and they only paid $400, so they saved money. Sure their checking account has less money, and now they don't have enough to pay the rent. All they keep talking about is how much they saved!

The people of White River Valley School Corporation are faced with some decisions; they are slowly loosing funds for their school. Current operations cannot continue maintaining the status quo. So you will be told we need to save money. Running three schools is redundant. We will be able to save money by consolidating.

The question becomes, can you spend money to save money? Let's say your car gets bad mileage, and you want to buy a higher fuel mileage auto. You spend $250 a month on gas and the new car will only use $150 worth of gas. Well this is nothing but math. You'll save $100 dollars a month for the next seven years. So you will save $8,400 over time. Anything you spend above that on a car is not saving money. You may buy a nicer car because you want it, and that is your choice, it's your money. But we all know the difference between spending and saving.

MGT of America performed a study on our schools. In that study it was determined: Savings of about $473,000 annually by operating one elementary school . So now we have our number. Just like the gas savings above, it now is nothing but simple math. Anything we do that will cost less than $473,000 annually would save money; anything we do that costs more would be spending money.

If you borrow $7.7 million at 2% for 20 years the payments are $472,000. So any action we take that spends over $7 million will basically save no money. A $5 million dollar project would realize approximately $170,000 in savings annually. Anyone that tries to talk you into spending more than $5 million on a project and claims you can save money is deceiving you.

The simple math rules out a new multi-million-dollar project. If the individual schools need fixed and it can be accomplished for less than $2.5 million each, that would be less money. If it cannot be done then the next decision is fix one of the schools for less than $5 million and close the other.

I challenge everyone not to fall into the trap of spending dollars in the name of saving dimes.

John Paul Coleman

Lyons

Make sure we have the correct address

To the Editor:

I would like to remind Greene County taxpayers that if you are one of us who have been blessed with trying to notify all the places that we get ( normal) mail from -- that we have a new -- 911 address please remember to notify the county auditor's office at 384-8658 as soon as you can.

Be reminded, tax bills will be prepared and mailed by mid-April 2012 and due by May 10, 2012. We have no way of being informed what your new address is (to do the tax bill mailing for the May 10 collection) so please get your address updated in time or you may not get your tax bill and it is the taxpayer's responsibility to make sure we have correct addresses.

Shelby Meurer

Greene County treasurer

Bloomfield