I'm humbled and gratified by having been elected Council President yesterday. With Valerie Ervin as Vice President, this is the first time since the 1995-96 term that the Council has had two female officers. I was sworn in immediately after the vote and will serve for one year.
I plan to focus on the economy as my top priority, as the County now faces a reality check. Our unemployment rate is higher than it has been in our recorded history. Our citizens have less with which to pay their bills, so we have less revenue to pay the County's bills. Anybody who balances a checkbook knows that we must make sacrifices and tighten our belts.
To achieve that, I will focus on three priorities this year. First, we need the County Executive to send us an aggressive cost cutting plan for the rest of the fiscal year. We have wonderful programs, but we can only provide those that the taxpayers, our bosses, can pay for. Second, I ask all of my colleagues to make sure that for every piece of legislation we consider, we carefully examine its fiscal costs and the economic impact on our residents. No new regulation is "free" or without some burden on taxpayers. Third, we need to engage in a full court press on advancing the County 's economic development goals.
At the entrance to my office, I keep a plaque with my favorite Winston Churchill quote, "Never, never, never give up." That speaks to me of the spirit and guts that our citizens bring to their lives every day. But Churchill was not just tough. He was also smart. So I pledge to follow another one of his observations, "Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen."
On that note, I encourage you to let me know your thoughts as we move into the new year. You can e-mail me at councilmember.floreen@montgomerycountymd.gov. Yes, our challenges are big this year, but they aren't bigger than our commitment and our ability to solve them if we all work together. I know we can keep Montgomery County on track as the great place it is to live and work.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
My Priorities for the Coming Year
Posted by
Councilmember Nancy Floreen
Labels:
economy,
president,
priorities
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3 comments:
Wow, a lot of negativity is going around, here.
Congratulations on your election to Council President, and to Ms Ervin as well on her election to Council VP.
No doubt you will recall that I am all about Saving Taxpayers Money.
No doubt you will also recall that I am now in business, and not in politics (not interested in running for anything, anyway).
And perhaps you will recall that I do IT, and just got a patent. And seeing how it's pretty clear that the County needs to upgrade a lot of IT systems, and seeing how it's probably important to spend taxpayer money in-County rather than spending it all on Redmond, WA's MicroSoft Corporation's products, I hope you'll promote Procurements from Montgomery residents who work and produce here.
I hate to resort to advertising on your blog, so maybe do a little research on your own. Ask your Linux and Mac OSX folks in your IT department if Linux is ready for the average County employee's desktop. If they say "you betcha", remember that I'm not the only unemployed UNIX/Linux/OSX specialist in the County. Lots of us want and need work, and we can find or make ways to save lots of money in these cash-strapped times.
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