Kokomo Tribune. April 6, 2010.
Use caution in work zones
It’s spring in Indiana. And with the changing of seasons, Hoosiers can count on the return of thunderstorms, daffodils and miles of orange cones on our highways.
The cones oftentimes are the only things separating fast-moving, 2-ton vehicles from road construction crews. The crewmembers’ very lives are dependent upon attentive driving by motorists.
But what those motorists might not realize is they’re more at risk of injury and death than the workers.
The Federal Highway Administration reports nearly 2.5 million people were injured and 41,059 were killed on our nation’s roads in 2007. That same year, however, 835 of those deaths occurred in work zones 2 percent of all roadway fatalities. In addition, more than 40,000 injuries occur in work zones.
That’s one work-zone death every 10 hours, and one work-zone injury every 13 minutes. What’s more, more than 4 out of 5 work-zone deaths were motorists.
Most work-zone accidents can be avoided, the Federal Highway Administration says. It offers these tips for driving safely in work zones:
Expect the unexpected. Normal speed limits might be reduced, traffic lanes might be changed and people might be working on or near the road.
Slow down. Speeding is one of the primary causes of work-zone crashes.
Don’t tailgate. The most common crash in a highway work zone is the rear-end collision.
Obey road crew flaggers. A flagger has the same authority as a regulatory sign, so you can be cited for disobeying his or her directions.
Stay alert and minimize distractions. Dedicate your full attention to the roadway and avoid changing radio stations or using cell phones in a work zone.
Keep up with the traffic flow. Motorists can help maintain traffic flow by merging as soon as possible. Don’t drive right up to the lane closure and then try to barge in.
Be patient and stay calm. Work zones aren’t there to personally inconvenience you.
The Herald Bulletin. April 7, 2010
Hutaree group pursued because of speech
The members of the Hutaree militia who were arrested last week had “dark hearts and evil intent,” according to a government prosecutor. They are accused of conspiring to kill police officers and wage war against the U.S. government. They were collecting guns and explosives, but they hadn’t done anything, just talked about it. They were arrested on conspiracy charges.
According to U.S. law, conspiracy charges can be prosecuted without the suspect actually making efforts toward that goal. Some states make taking action toward the crime a prerequisite. Indiana’s laws states: “A person attempts to commit a crime when, acting with the culpability required for commission of the crime, he engages in conduct that constitutes a substantial step toward commission of the crime.”
The government has to be careful when it begins alleging conspiracy because that can be an umbrella term for anything the government wants it to mean.
U.S. law says this: “It is important to note that an actual crime is not necessary to prosecute a conspiracy case _ only the stated intent to break the law.” In effect, this is prosecuting speech. …
What the Hutaree members and the Florida conspirators had in common was a federal mole who infiltrated their groups. These are paid informants who lavish cash on the groups they enter, egg them on their destructive paths and keep giving them moral support when their spirits lag. The informants have a financial stake in making sure the feds can make a case. It’s insidious that a law-enforcement agency would pay people to ensure a crime is committed. Oftentimes, these infiltrators were actual FBI agents, which should mean that the FBI is complicit in the crime.
But none of that ever plays out in court where the focus is on the groups and their leaders and what they wanted to do.
Since Sept. 11, FBI radar has been fine-tuned to any supposed terrorist activity. In 2009, the Justice Department sent out fliers to local law enforcement agencies warning of a rise in militia and white supremacy groups of the kind that gave us Timothy McVeigh who reduced the federal building in Oklahoma City to rubble in 1995. The Southern Poverty Law Center recently reported a 300 percent rise in what it calls hate groups since President Obama was elected. So it’s understandable that the government is edgy in these matters.
But there’s a loss of liberty in such sweeping law-enforcement efforts. The public never knows how much of these cases are actually based on evidence or prosecutor hyperbole, and convictions often rely on the latter. These cases _ which punish thought and speech and association, all guaranteed by the Constitution _ are a miscarriage of justice. There must be a better way.
In Summary: There’s a loss of liberty in sweeping law enforcement efforts based on what is said and not what is done.
The Indianapolis Star. April 9, 2010.
Put townships out of business
Across Indiana, government on most levels is hurting for cash. The state has cut funding for virtually every program, including education. Schools are threatening to lay off teachers. Libraries may close.
Yet, there’s one layer of government that still sits atop a mountain of taxpayers’ money. An Indianapolis Star investigation last year found that Indiana’s 1,006 townships had socked away more than $200 million in reserves. Marion County’s nine townships accounted for more than $48 million of that total.
Given high unemployment and other lingering effects of the recession, surely townships have spent down their reserves in the past year? Not even close.
In fact, the Evansville Courier & Press recently found that township surpluses have grown _ to an incredible $263 million, according to audits by the State Board of Accounts.
Think about that: With hundreds of thousands of Hoosiers in desperate need of help because of lost jobs and falling incomes, township trustees, assigned the duty of distributing poor relief, continue to hoard more and more money.
Despite such outrages, the Indiana General Assembly has stubbornly refused to eliminate this grossly inefficient and outdated layer of bureaucracy. Legislators’ primary motivation for protecting township government is for partisan political gain.
Township government is a starter office for many politicians. It’s also a vehicle for recruiting grassroots workers for political campaigns. Although such entry points into the political process may have some value, they’re poor reasons for continuing to saddle taxpayers with the expense and inefficiency of an 18th-century model of local government.
Although townships may have made sense in horse-and-buggy days, they’re far from necessary in an age of instant communication.
It’s that very lack of purpose that helps explain why townships are able to stockpile reserves at the same time that other branches of state and local government have suffered from deep budget cuts.
Other layers of government are meeting real needs _ needs that grew as the economy slipped. Townships, in contrast, exist largely to further the political careers of party insiders.
Voters should make a simple demand of every legislative candidate on this year’s ballot: Work for us rather than your political friends by finally eliminating township government.
Journal and Courier. April 8, 2010.
As economy bounces back, limit spending
News that Indiana’s revenue from sales and income taxes exceeded projections for the first time in 17 months lifted hope that the recession’s stranglehold on the state might be easing.
Indiana collected $908 million in taxes last month. That’s up $7 million from March 2009 and is about $2 million more than had been predicted in a revised forecast prepared in December.
But even if revenues continue to rebound, Indiana has a long way to go before it climbs out of its financial hole.
The state’s revenue still is off $867 million from the May 2009 forecast that was used to prepare the biennial budget, and revenues are $64 million below December 2009 revised projections.
To deal with the recession, Gov. Mitch Daniels cut state agencies by 20 percent, trimmed $300 million from K-12 education and sliced $150 million from higher education. On top of this, the state’s $1.3 billion reserves will be wiped out by the time the current budget ends on June 30, 2011.
Complicating the unexpected bounce in March revenues, the recently adopted federal health insurance expansion law will bleed off $25 million from state coffers for pharmacy rebates.
Additionally, any hope that more state revenue might translate into money for school districts struggling with budget cuts is misplaced.
Lawmakers and Daniels promised last year that if the economy improved, education would reap the windfall, but state finances are so battered it would take several months of exceeding revenue expectations to fulfill those promises. If March revenues signal a rebound and can be sustained, the best news for school districts is that the extra cash might stall future funding cuts.
Even though revenues are up, unemployment _ both nationally and at the state level _ remains unchanged, despite recent statistics that indicate more jobs were created.
The news in the last week is cause for guarded optimism, but like most economic news, one or two promising signs do not make a recovery.
“One month of reversing a trend is not enough to say we’re going to start the spending spree again in Indiana,” state Budget Director Chris Ruhl told the Associated Press. “The goal remains the same: Spend within our means, protect Hoosier taxpayers and maintain the size and scope of government within an affordable means.”
If revenues improve over the coming months, Hoosiers at every level of government must resist the temptation to spend, as Ruhl cautioned. There are reserves that need to be replenished, and officials should think twice about the difficult lessons learned in the recession before advocating a return to the spending habits of the years that preceded the economic collapse.
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