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Re: [RC] CA State Parks; what I found out - Barbara McCraryI attended a meeting today at which we were discussing the salaries paid to members of various agencies. To be fair, I believe they were County agencies, but our county says it's broke, too. Some of the salaries were from $150,000 to $180,000. Considering that some of these agencies have jobs that seem to work at making life difficult for business owners, I would think some of those salaries could be reduced a little and the money applied to running parks, police, education, health care, et al. Furthermore, there have been studies of the retirement packages some public employees now receive...something like 90% of the highest salary within their period of duty and the retirement age is comparatively young, as opposed to business owners, farmers and others self-employed.I'm not convinced some of the folks who manage those agencies really deserve such generous salaries, but there is naturally great reluctance to reduce the salaries. Of course, no one wants to take a pay cut, but private businesses are losing money and thus taking cuts, so why not public service employees. Furthermore, I feel there are far too many agencies and boards within the state. There is either an overlap in duties or some of them are not really productive. I would think a little trimming of overlapping agencies would help our state budget a lot. There is some evidence that the state park budget is rather small compared to education, police, health care. I would think that shutting down parks is counter-productive, since they do take in fees for use. I also think that if the parks are closed, there will considerable rampant misuse, because people can get in anyway, and even with the parks up and running, they are currently being used as marijuana gardens in remote areas. There is considerable concern that they will become homes for the homeless, and with sanitation facilities closed and locked, the situation could become quite bad. Vandalism is another concern. An expensive beachside toilet unit was burned down in a nearby park. Another consideration is that parks attract tourists, especially now with high fuel prices and the economic crash. Without parks, where do folks go for vacations? And without the vacationers, where do the nearby towns get a good part of their summer revenue? It's all so intertwined.... Horseback riders will still be able to access our local state parks, but they may be closed to endurance rides. Barbara in CA ----- Original Message ----- From: "k s swigart" <katswig@xxxxxxx> To: <ridecamp@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Thursday, June 11, 2009 9:48 AM Subject: [RC] CA State Parks; what I found out Management accounting is REALLLLLLLY hard if you have a complicated "business" structure like and entire state's economy with all its interrelated elements. There may be some substantial "unintended consequences" associated with closing the parks. Politicians are really good at missing those. The state would do better to try to figure out ways to cut the expenses of operating the parks without closing them...or to charge more for people to use them, so they become bigger revenue generators. kat Orange County, Calif. :) =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Ridecamp is a service of Endurance Net, http://www.endurance.net. Information, Policy, Disclaimer: http://www.endurance.net/Ridecamp Subscribe/Unsubscribe http://www.endurance.net/ridecamp/logon.asp Ride Long and Ride Safe!! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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