| Indiana's latest 'oops' cause for concern Government financing has often been described as an inexact science, but the state of Indiana has taken that designation to unprecedented levels. What should be considered most trou-blesome is the issue of whether anyone, much earlier along the way, raised a questioning hand and suggested that things just didn't seem right about these numbers. 4 mil-lion. 1 million out of the general fund and the budgets of the parks and recreation and highway departments to make up for lost revenue when the city abandons a controversial trash fee policy. Jennings County is expected to receive $330,000 and interest from the state to cover the local income tax revenue short-age, which won't make up for what it had to cut but makes the process somewhat less onerous. The implication seemed to be, what's a difference of $205 million or so, especially since the counties were getting their just shares with interest. Bartholomew County will receive $2 million back from the state. The second error has proved to be per-sonally costly for Department of Revenue Commissioner John Eckert, who submit-ted his resignation. No one resigned or was fired over that discrepancy, which probably would have vanished in the collective memory of the public had the aforementioned Depart-ment of Revenue not come forward last week with an admission that it had "mis-placed" another $205 million in local in-come tax revenues. Unfortunately, reaction to these errors is being cast in terms of how they have served to embarrass Daniels, who has been hailed for his businesslike economic plan that has, indeed, made Indiana's treasury the envy of his peers. While that would be considered a major bookkeeping error by most accountants, Gov. It's time to put aside the oft-used excuse of programming error and ask how anyone can offer missed discrepancies amounting to $525 million. The money should have been distributed among 91 of Indiana's 92 counties, a process that is now under way. It's pure stupidity. |
Monday, 9 April 2012
Indiana's latest 'oops' cause for concern
