County must elect Mercadante, re-elect Welter

I’m writing because I agree with Grundy County Board candidate Curt Mercadante’s comments in your recent story (“Getting Involved,” Dec. 23, 2011) about the large number of candidates running for Grundy County Board.

As Curt correctly points out, there is frustration among the county voters at the state of our county government.

While Grundy County families are struggling in this challenging economy, the county board has gone on a spending binge. As Christina Chapman writes in that story, the county board has issued almost $13 million in new bonds during the past three years — but that doesn’t include interest.

These bonds are new debt paid for by we, the taxpayers, in a down economy.

Last year, we elected new leadership and a new Republican majority with the hopes that this would put a stop to the spending.

Unfortunately, some Republicans have joined the incumbent Democrats in voting for more spending and slowing down efforts to save the taxpayers money.

This is why I’m supporting Curt’s campaign for Grundy County Board, as well as that of incumbent county board member David Welter.

Both Curt and David are committed to fighting wasteful spending and bringing more transparency to county government.

I know they both would put an end to the generous health care benefits provided to the part-time politicians on the county board — and they both want to consolidate county board committees to save the taxpayers money.

It’s time we stop electing people to local office simply because we recognize their last names, are members of the same clubs, or run in the same circle of friends.

We can’t afford to keep electing the same people and hoping for different results.

2012 is a year to make a real change on the Grundy County Board. The way to do that is by electing Curt Mercadante and re-electing David Welter.