Week in Review
Library Meeting, May 4
Library Director Jessica Spangler insisted that the minutes of the prior meeting show that she was “threatened” in a private conversation by a Hillsdale resident (Karen Hill allegedly witnessed the alleged incident). Yet performing for the camera, Spangler put her comment de facto on the record. Library board trustee George Allen objected to the language, preferring that the record state that the director “felt threatened,” lest unreported and possibly dubious accusations go on the public record. This, however, was not good enough; Spangler berated Allen for not believing all women. “Do you think I wasn’t threatened?” she queried, summoning up tears. “It’s very disappointing that this has to be a conversation that we’re having right now.” The women of the board piled on. Hill performed her usual choreographed solemnities, and Stephanie Meyers insisted that “a threat is a threat.”
Councilman Bruce Sharp attended the meeting to advertise how little connection he has to the college. Though his son attended as an undergraduate, you need not worry, Bruce assured us: that was his son with his first wife.
Public comment of the year so far goes to Jack McClain, who, a month after challenging the library board’s three-minute-maximum public comment, spent the first thirty seconds and last thirty seconds of his time staring at the floor in silence.
Notes on the HCS “Millage Renewal” (Tax Increase)
When a “millage” is “renewed” at the same rate as before, your taxes increase, and the entity asking receives more money. This is due to the higher assessment values of homes, set by the city. Barring a real estate crisis or deflation of the dollar, this pattern holds.
The people of Hillsdale have a limited amount of money. Appropriating taxes to any particular organization necessarily takes that money’s availability away from other potential uses. Questions of taxation are never free of partisan claims, as some experts claim.
For example, the City of Hillsdale currently (and potentially illegally) charges specific neighborhoods excessive fines ($5,000-$8,000) with high interest rates (7%) to get their roads fixed, despite those citizens paying:
3.94 mills per year for “city streets/leaf [non]collection,” and
2.43 mills per year for “city street maintenance.”
Setting Hillsdale County and Intermediate School District property taxes aside, focusing on (1) the city and (2) HCS only:
Hillsdale Community Schools receives 25.8 mills worth of property taxes per year.
You pay 51.12 mills per year to fund city and HCS expenditures.
This means that 50.5% (25.8/51.12) of your taxes remaining within the city goes to funding the Hillsdale Community Schools.1
Upcoming Events
Today, May 10, 6:30 PM: The Hillsdale County Democrats will host their annual Harry S. Truman Dinner at former library board candidate Dan LaRue’s stomping grounds, the Hillsdale Senior Center, a publicly funded entity that provides essential services to seniors, such as tai chi forms, qigong exercises, and photo shoots at Fether Studios.
May 15: City Council will take up, among other things:
The no-camping ordinance proposal; doubtless the homeless and some of their distraught lifestyle advocates will attend to mau-mau the Flack Catchers.
The Jansen Files;
Possible discussion regarding Mayor Stockford’s appointment for the fifth library board position.
May 19-May 23: The Jonesville Riverfest.
External Links
First Things editor R. R. Reno: “Some Christian leaders are beginning to recognize that aspects of the sexual revolution such as gay rights, and even contraception and feminism, are not narrowly moral questions or matters to be judged in light of particular biblical passages. They are aspects of a cultural revolution that wars against the limiting constraints of our bodies.”
Joel Kotkin: “Demography may be destiny, but it is geography that determines its political shape. The greatest division today is to do with place: in particular, three basic terroirs — urban, suburban and rural — which reflect a divergence in economic interest, family structure and basic values, particularly between big city economies and those on the periphery.”
David Bernhardt: “During my 12 years in government I often saw career bureaucrats push their preferred policy passions irrespective of agencies’ rules, federal regulations or the law. This included career employees needlessly limiting recreational activities in national parks, imposing unneeded burdens on historic preservation and inappropriately restricting activities in the name of species preservation. The list goes on, as does our nation’s departure from representative democracy.”
Micah Meadowcroft: “In making passivity the smart, default response to disorder and danger, we are forming cities of cowards.”
Scott Yenor questions the canonizing power of “representation” in selecting the “great books.”
Rick Beato predicts “the AI effect” on the music industry.
According to The Hill, Tucker Carlson’s “we’re back” tweet “amassed 100 million views in less than 24 hours.”