Weekend opinion: Shake-up needed in Franklin County, and A BiG No to lawmaker pay raises

Morning, In Boxers.  Here’s a look at the opinion churning out there in the North Country mediosphere.  We’ll start with the Adirondack Daily Enterprise, which is proposing a major reform to the way Franklin County handles local politics.

Franklin County would be better off with a board of supervisors and weighted voting, like Essex County has, than with its board of separately elected legislators.

The article goes on to lay out a detailed argument for the change.  As someone who lives in a village divided by two counties — one with a legislature, the other with a board of supervisors — I think this one’s worth a read.

The Plattsburgh Press-Republican chimes in on the notion floated in Albany that, despite the state’s lingering budget woes, state lawmakers might have earned themselves a raise.

The idea was brought up recently by New York Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, who noted that legislators and commissioners haven’t had a pay increase in 13 years.

That certainly is a long period of time for anyone to manage without a raise, when inflation has boosted prices for most everything. But, frankly, the best pay increases are based on merit — and New York legislators, for the most part, haven’t earned one.

The Glens Falls Post Star is arguing that state officials need to take the next big step in property tax reform, not just capping the amount that governments can raise rates, but capping the amount that each individual is forced to pay.

The circuit breaker, in brief, would put a percentage limit on the amount of property taxes individuals would have to pay relative to their incomes. So, for example, people earning $100,000 or less might have to pay no more than 10 percent of their income ($10,000) in property taxes. The circuit breaker addresses some of the worst inequities of the property tax system.

Denton Publications, meanwhile, is hailing creative efforts to bring high speed broadband connections to more of the Adirondack North Country.

A small-scale broadband project in the southern Adirondacks appears to offer a promising solution that might be applicable to vast areas of the Park.

In Thurman, an entrepreneur is working with the town government to bring fast, affordable broadband to the town’s 1,200 households. The access is based on broadcasting digital signals over the “white space” between television station signals on the radio-wave spectrum. The Internet connection through this technology is up to eight times faster than satellite. The system transmits signals from dozens of existing telephone poles throughout the rural town to small antennas at households.

The technology is promising, because it works over hilly terrain, and transmits through foliage, unlike other digital broadcast options.

There you go.  Happy Winter Carnival weekend, wherever your carnival is taking place!  Comments welcome below.

Tags: opinion