Recently, Councilwoman Denise Lee opined that “she would rather see the city use more reserves if it could keep people from losing work during this recession”. Our question to Councilwoman Lee is since when did the Jacksonville city government become a jobs program? The last time that we checked, city government was supposed to provide essential services to Jacksonville taxpayers, not create jobs for city government employees. Considering the pension costs associated with these employees, maybe a few layoffs could save us a lot of money now and in the future.

If you do not agree, consider the Florida Times Union story on the Equal Business Opportunity office. Apparently, productivity for this office was measured in number of websites viewed per hour by its employees rather than in anything useful to the taxpayers who are footing its bill. Not surprisingly, a sharp reduction in staff who seemed to not having anything better to do with their time was recommended by the Inspector General’s office. We couldn’t agree more.