I was thinking about pecking at Lompoc for its budget issue again this week—you know, the same one that some current Lompoc City Council members failed to address during the last budget cycle—but I’m moving on to more important things.
Lompoc’s got an even bigger problem to deal with. Balloons.
Some kid (probably) lost their metallic, mylar balloon, and it wandered into a powerline, causing 4,142 homes to lose power in central and southern Lompoc on April 22! The power was only out for about an hour, according to a press release sent out by city Public Information Officer Samantha Scroggin.
Apparently, balloons were such an epidemic that the state Legislature passed a law in 2017 making it a criminal act to release a balloon outside. Then Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed that bill, saying that “criminal penalties aren’t the solution to every problem.” True dat Moonbeam. Dodged a bullet there little Lompokian!
OK, maybe balloons really aren’t as important as City Councilmembers Jim Mosby, Victor Vega, and Dirk Starbuck advocating to cut a bunch of staff for the second budget cycle in a row, rather than bringing more revenue in like city staff said they need to do!
Guess what? The pension obligation balloon is already in flight and the city is running to catch it, falling farther and farther behind.
During a recent discussion about the 2019-21 budget, Mosby claimed he was worried about potential money generated from sales tax revene not being spent where it’s needed. I hate to burst your no-new-taxes balloon, Mosby, but the city of Santa Maria managed to figure out how to raise revenue with a sales tax increase and spend it on public safety.
The Canary hates dodging free-floating balloons. Send comments to canary@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Apr 25 – May 2, 2019.